


From Here to Eternity

by vtn



Category: Electronic Dance Music RPF
Genre: Angst, Coming Out, Family, London, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-07
Updated: 2009-07-07
Packaged: 2017-11-18 05:11:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 33,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/557231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vtn/pseuds/vtn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first few years of Erol and Rory's relationship: figuring themselves out, figuring out how to make a relationship work, dealing with family reactions, making friendships and memories; and the music that ties it all together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	From Here to Eternity

**Author's Note:**

> Plays fast and loose with reality (timelines, etc). The family are all original characters, though a couple of them are the real names. Title is from Giorgio Moroder, but you knew that already.

_Now, your daddy don't mind_

_And your mommy don't mind_

_If we have another dance, dear, just one more_

_One more time_

_Oh, won't you stay_

_Just a little bit longer_

\--Maurice Williams

 

The band leaves the stage and the crowd begins to clear, save for a few stragglers who are left behind.  Rory Phillips is one of these.  He has misplaced his bus timetable.  And even so, it's late, later than he thought it would be.  But it could have been four in the morning, and he'd have stayed until the final note.  Suede is one of those bands that you have to stay for.  He just wishes he weren't so far from home.  He has to switch trains a couple of times between and he'll have to share the Tube stations with all the bad sorts.

 

"Great show, wasn't it?"

 

Rory looks up from rifling through his bag.  Grinning down at him is a tall lanky boy with long, shiny black hair, dark eyes and a hawk's nose.  He looks a bit Middle Eastern, maybe.  And he's not unfamiliar either.  Rory would swear the last five shows he's been to, he's seen this kid.  It's not like he's hard to miss, the way he stands a head above the rest of the crowd.  

 

"Yeah," says Rory a little absentmindedly.

 

"Do you know, I keep seeing you around," says the boy.

 

"Yeah," Rory says again.  Then he smiles.  "I mean, I recognized you.  You're—you're that guy."

 

"Oh, God," says the boy, smacking his forehead.  "Don't tell me you saw--"

 

"Oh, no, I don't have any nasty rumors about you, so don't start giving me ammo."  The boy's face lightens.  "I just mean, you're at, like, every show I ever go to..."

 

"Erol Alkan," he says, although at the time Rory isn't sure quite what he says, extending a huge hand which Rory shakes.  Rory repeats the syllables in his head, air-oh-lal-can, trying to make sense of them.  Is that a first name?  A first name and a last name?  Where does the first name end?  His brain is hardly functioning at this hour.

 

"Rory," says Rory.  "Sorry, could you say that again?"

 

"Erol," says Erol, and Rory feels his world is once again at peace.  "Erol Alkan.  Where are you from?"

 

Rory tells him.  "I've no idea how I'm going to get home tonight."

 

"Oh."  Erol grins.  "I live right around here.  I could put you up."  Rory considers this.  It does sound convenient, but on the other hand how is he supposed to know Erol isn't some kind of creep who's going to steal his things in the night?  Oh, wait, that's because he hasn't got anything of value.  And besides, Rory has a natural inclination, however irrational, to trust anyone who goes to all the same shows as he does.  

 

"Could you really?"  Rory does his best to look pathetic and hopeful.  Erol shrugs as if to say, why not?  "Oh, thank you loads, let me just go find a telephone booth so I can let my mum know not to worry about me.  I'll just say I'm staying with a friend."  

 

Erol nods, and he leans against the side of the telephone booth near the club looking effortlessly cool in his tight black jacket while Rory spends his last pound coin on a call home.  By the time he's done, he realizes his hands are shaking.  He's excited.  So sue him!  Honestly he doesn't know anyone like Erol; he's had to be the one who educated all his friends from home as to what music everyone ought to be listening to.  And this will be sort of like an adventure.

 

Erol doesn't shut his mouth for more than ten seconds on the quick bus ride back to his street, going on about how excited he was to hear certain tracks and how he just picked up a really rare pressing of one of their singles and so on and so forth, occasionally interspersed with a "God, I'm really just talking your ear off aren't I?" to which Rory shakes his head emphatically.  He gets a comment in every once in a while, but it's clear to him Erol knows much more about Suede and music in general than Rory ever will.  

 

When they get to Erol's place, Rory breathes a sigh of relief to see Erol still lives with his parents.  How awful can he really be, right?  

 

"If we wake my dad up I'll never hear the end of it," Erol warns as they creep up the stairs.  

 

It seems that Erol's room is in the attic.  Rory just has one at the end of the same hall as his brother Bill's room, but otherwise this could practically _be_ Rory's own room.  Erol's wall is covered in posters of all of Rory's favorite bands—there's Suede, and Pulp, and Blur, and the Manics, and so on and so forth—as well as some Rory's never heard of.  One side of the floor is practically buried in records, and the whole room has the smell of aging sleeves, all musk and dust.  Rory can't resist poking around while Erol takes off his shoes and jacket.  He turns over LPs with bright covers, wondering.

 

"Oh my God," he suddenly bursts out.  It's a copy of David Bowie's _The Man Who Sold the World_ , which is the one Bowie album he doesn't have and he still hasn't heard it yet.  "Do you think your mum and dad would hear if we--"

 

"Don't worry," says Erol, just as enthusiastic.  For some bizarre reason Erol seems to have three record players, but he reaches for the one that already has a record lying on top.  There is a soft hissing sound as Erol puts the needle on the Bowie LP, and Rory feels himself shiver with excitement.  Nothing is better than that sound.

 

\---

 

About two hours later, with Erol hyperactively switching from record to record as he thinks of things that Rory _has to hear_ , Erol leans back on his bed and says, "I am absolutely murdered, I think it's bed time."

 

Rory agrees.  At home he would have nodded off hours ago.

 

"Do you have an extra blanket?" Rory asks sheepishly, realizing he's rather cold.

 

"What, you think you're going to get cold?"  Erol is almost laughing at him.  Rory can't figure out what's so funny, but either way Erol is nice enough to toss him a wool blanket that looks very warm indeed.  He wraps it around himself and lies down on the floor.  He'll be asleep very soon at this rate.

 

"Oh," says Erol.  Now he sounds confused.  "Did you think I was going to make you sleep on the floor?"

 

Rory frowns.  "I'm already imposing on you, it's not a problem."

 

"Oh, dear," says Erol.  "No, I think I've--"  He sighs, and slips off the bed.  "Get up," he says, "Won't you?"

 

Rory stands.  He wraps the blanket tighter around his shoulders.  "I don't understand what you--"

 

"Rory," says Erol.  He puts his hand on Rory's neck, slides it up to Rory's cheek.  It is really not supposed to be there.  "You're a bit thick, aren't you, Rory?"

 

And then Erol's mouth is on his mouth.  His tongue is pushing into Rory's mouth, and he's breathing hot down Rory's throat.  This should not happen.  Rory.  Is not.  Gay.  But a kiss, they say, is just a kiss. Maybe if a kiss will guarantee him a warm place to sleep, it's worth it.  In fact, kissing a boy doesn't really feel different from kissing a girl, except it doesn't taste like lipstick.  So he kisses back, lets Erol muss his hair in the back, press him towards the bed.  The bed, the bed, the bed, oh no--

 

"E-Erol," Rory says, "I think, I think I can't, I think..."  He pauses.  The next thing he says is not at all what he expects to say.  "I don't think we should have sex tonight."  Tonight?  Tonight?  At all.  Right?

 

"What?"  Erol stands up, stops pressing his warm body into Rory's, leaving Rory feeling even colder than he did before.  He _likes_ Erol.  Does that have to be a gay thing?  That he just wants to spend time with him?  

 

"Can I just..." Rory begins.  Erol is climbing onto the bed now.  "Can I sleep in your bed anyway?"  Erol quirks an eyebrow.

 

"You are so odd," he says, but he sort of looks like he isn't opposed to Rory's oddness.  

 

"It's warm," Rory says, a bit embarrassed.  "And I'm really tired."

 

"Come on, then," says Erol, patting the bed next to him.  This is weird for Rory too, of course.  He's asking himself with every second why he's doing this, why he'd ever do this.  But he gets under the blankets, and Erol moves close to him, kisses his mouth, touches his face, and Rory feels warm.  He feels Erol's bony hips against his.  He feels what he quickly realizes is Erol's penis pressing into his leg, and it's hard.  It isn't as weird as he expects it to be, though.  It's probably because he's so exhausted.  He just sort of acknowledges the fact that he's sleeping in a bed with another boy, and that boy has a hard-on, okay, can we move on?  

 

For a moment it registers that maybe he should do something about it, but then he's drifting off to sleep and he doesn't wake till the late morning.

 

\---

 

When Rory does wake, his immediate instinct is to be unfazed.  He is happy that there's a warm body next to him.  And then he remembers.

 

He looks around himself and notices nothing has actually changed.  This is a bit of a surprise to him, because what he should have considered last night is that Erol could have utterly ignored Rory's request for just _sleeping_ together and, well, touched him or done things to him.  But Erol looks to be as trustworthy as Rory oddly assumed he was last night.  He has an arm stretched across Rory's back, and he is softly breathing.

 

"Erol Alkan!" Rory hears a female voice call, and realizes why he was woken up.  "There is breakfast for you and your friend on the table!"  Um, nice!  Rory never gets served breakfast, except on Easter and Christmas.  He shakes Erol, who mumbles and rolls over.

 

Rory rolls out of the bed, and with a start it occurs to him that Erol's _parents_ have been here the whole time.  That is; he'd known they were there, but the fact that Erol is gay brings it a whole new meaning.  Do they, you know, do they not _mind_ him sleeping with boys in his attic bedroom?

 

"E-ROL!" Erol's mother calls, and Erol lets out a loud "Shitting _fuck_!"before hopping down to the floor and shoving Rory toward the stairs.  Stumbling onto the landing, Rory nearly does a faceplant, but he rights himself and is able to get down the stairs, Erol following sleepily after.

 

The kitchen smells of toasted bread; to Rory's delight, they're having buttered muffins. 

 

"Hello," he says.  Standing by the table with a butter knife is a tall woman with long waves of black hair drawn up around chopsticks, a stern expression, and a prominent 'beauty mark' near her nose.  The bearded man reading a newspaper equally sternly at the table underneath a gigantic eyebrow could only be her husband.  "I'm Rory..."

 

"Welcome," says the woman.  "I am Fatma.  This is Faruk.  I'm sorry about my son--"

 

"Fatma," says Faruk warningly, and then mumbles at her under his breath in a language Rory doesn't understand.  (Of course, he can only understand English and French, the latter of which he takes in school.)  

 

Fatma turns around and says "Erol, really, though, you should have introduced your friend."

 

"I just woke up," says Erol, tossing his hair in a way that makes Rory realize how much of an idiot he was not to get that Erol was gay.  In fact, Erol is probably the gayest person Rory has ever met.  "Which was what, about five hours of sleep, then?"

 

"It's no worry," says Rory.  As Fatma is herding him into a chair, he goes on, "And thanks so much for breakfast, you really didn't have to--"

 

"Mum and dad always treat guests like kings and queens," says Erol, rolling his eyes.  Rory almost wants to smack him.  Of all the spoiled things to say!

 

"Fatma," says Faruk, and then starts going off in whatever.  Fatma passes him the butter and clears her throat. 

 

"English please," she says, gesturing meaningfully at Rory.  Rory couldn't care less, but to be frank he's a little bit terrified of Erol's parents.  They're both taller than he is, and he thinks they could potentially murder him with their eyes.  Rory's parents are both just so bland and sweet and, well, English.

 

A plate of muffins gets passed around.  Rory butters one and passes it on to Erol, suppressing a giggle when Faruk butters a muffin and puts it somewhere between his high newspaper and his eyebrow.  Fatma is eating fruit.  Well, there's something.  Rory's mum is halfheartedly 'on a diet' as well.

 

"Where are you from, Rory?" asks Fatma.  She says his name a bit funny, but he realizes he'd probably say hers all wrong too if he tried.

 

"By Richmond tube station," says Rory.  "It's why Erol brought me home with him last night.  A longer ride than I wanted to make home from Soho at half two."  Fatma nods.

 

"Do you want to phone your parents?" she says.  "So they won't worry."

 

"Already did," says Rory cheerily.  Fatma is becoming less intimidating by the second, as long as Rory ignores the fact that he snogged her son.  "This happens a lot actually, me getting stranded in Soho."

 

"It's true," Erol pipes up for the first time.  Having food in his stomach seems to have given him a little life.  "I've seen him at nearly every show I've been to."

 

"Oh, look at that," says Faruk, "A friend you will not have to indoctrinate."  

 

"It's not indoctrination.  People need to know," Erol insists, but there's a wry gleam in his eye that tells Rory he's not being entirely serious.  In fact, he actually looks happy.  Like maybe he isn't angry at Rory for refusing his offer.  Like maybe they can pretend that the whole thing never happened.

 

\---

 

Erol's parents send Rory home with some extra biscuits and some cheese for his parents.  For some reason, Rory feels bizarrely happy.  He almost wants to skip down the pavement a little on the way to the bus stop, but he controls his urge.  This is almost as nice as actually sleeping with a girl.  The feeling of being liked, of being able to really connect to somebody—he likes that.  

 

So what if Erol thinks he's a bender?  Rory will get it all settled eventually.  It's not like he's breaking Erol's heart.  Erol's a handsome bloke, if a bit girly.  He'll find someone else to get it on with, and Erol and Rory can go on being friends.

 

\---

 

On the Tube Rory is watching a small child press her face to the window, leaving foggy smears on the glass.  Poor thing is probably going to get the Black Death or something.  Rory always feels this compulsion to take a shower every time he goes on the trains.  And when he's slept in someone else's bed.  Right now he's so itching to get clean he's ready to jump out of his skin.

 

And then he thinks, maybe Erol is upset, maybe that's why he was sullen when he woke up.  Or worse, maybe Erol was chipper at breakfast because he thinks that when Rory said "not tonight", he meant "not tonight but maybe some other night, maybe soon".  Is that worse?  Rory isn't actually sure.  He's not considering being _sodomized_ but he could go for more kisses.  Wait, no.  That's not how it's supposed to go.  Oh, God.  Erol's probably just rubbing off on him.  He's going to stop thinking about it.  He'll get home, there'll be girls at school—it's not like he can't get a girl, he's not so desperate that he's going to start going for blokes, even girly ones like Erol.

 

No.  That's not what it is.  It's just that he's excited about _knowing_ Erol.  Because Erol loves his music, and Erol goes to his shows, and finally there's someone in his life who really understands.

 

\---

 

Rory tries not to think about it for a week.  And then it's Friday night, and there's a show.  He doesn't want to face the possibility that Erol might be there and awkward feelings would ruin everything but there's a show.  It's the Charming Thieves, a local band that Rory loves loves loves and has played their demo cassette to the point where the tape has worn thin and skips; there's a show, a show and he has to go.

 

It actually turns out to be in a record shop basement.  And of course it's in Central London.  Rory gets the time wrong and waits outside for forty-five minutes while a girl in leopardskin tights borrows his lighter and then proceeds to blow a lot of smoke in his face and rant about how Lionel (the lead singer) won't fuck her.  When the van finally pulls around the corner and the band begins to spill out, Rory's heart stops.

 

\---

\---

 

Lionel Fleming has a very luxurious flat for a bloke who hasn't done much with his life other than playing with bands and making hideous paintings.  Erol has narrowed it down to one of the following: a wealthy benefactor, a successful lawsuit, or a sizable inheritance.  As he treads on gorgeous Persian rugs with his boots still on, brushing past alabaster statues of (what else?) pretty, naked boys, he plays this game.  It's better than giving his full attention to Lionel going on and on about nothing in particular.

 

Luckily Lionel is better behaved once they get into the bedroom.  And what a bedroom.  Four-poster bed, more naked boy statues—and if that doesn't make Erol self-conscious, nothing can—and pillows heaped high.  Lionel urges Erol up onto the stack of pillows, and has redirected his stream-of-consciousness in the direction of 'let's talk about how gorgeous you are and all the ways I'm going to use you to pleasure myself'.

 

"I'm going to rub my dick all over your pretty face," says Lionel.  That's nice, Erol wants to say, but he bites off his sarcasm.  It's not like Lionel's unattractive.  In fact, while he's not as good looking as he was in the Venusian Femmes days, Erol would still give him a chance regardless of possible bonus features.

 

"I think I'd like that," says Erol, twisting his mouth into a boyish smile.  "I bet you've got a big cock.  I love a big man."  Lionel makes an almost grunting noise, odd coming from between the lips of such an effeminate man.  He probably hasn't got a big cock, and is insecure about it.  Erol finds, though, that giving just about anyone the 'oh you have such a huge thick cock, I want you to fill me and spread me open' spiel works even if it's obvious (as is often the case) that he's much better endowed than his partner.

 

Lionel unbuttons his trousers, gestures for Erol to lie down.  Erol does.  Lionel kneels above him, and proceeds to do...exactly what he's said.  He's hard already, and he just runs his erection all over Erol's face and neck, making a series of decidedly comic facial expressions.  When Erol so much as opens his mouth, he is met with a squeak of "don't you _dare_!" and ceases to open his mouth in the future.  He has to swallow his own spit every once in a while so he doesn't choke on it, but that's about it.  He just lies still, and soon Lionel is coming on Erol's face.  Erol blinks and automatically raises a hand to his face to wipe away the fluids.  

 

"Would you like to use my shower?" Lionel says, sounding caring, like he means to look after Erol.  Common post-coital reaction, Erol thinks, although that wasn't exactly coitus.  He doesn't know quite what it was.  Briefly he wonders if Lionel uses his statues for the same purpose, and when he's almost sick, he quickly turns his thoughts in another direction.

 

He leaves the bathroom door open, of course, while he showers, and Lionel watches him halfheartedly and paints in a corner.

 

\---

 

They ride in the band van over to the show that night; the record shop they're playing at is closed and Chris Vain, the guitarist, has to unlock it.  Erol sits in the back with Lionel's hand on his knee, trying to steady the container of sticky rice with soy sauce he's eating out of.  (In a stunning display of class, Lionel 'treated Erol to dinner' by ordering Chinese for both of them.)  

 

"All right," Chris calls, and they disembark.  Lionel keeps his arm possessively about Erol's back, rubbing his hand in circles over the space between Erol's shoulder blades.  They walk over toward the venue when Erol spots a familiar face and nearly whoops for joy.  He'd feared he scared away Rory for good.  

 

"Pardon me, I've got to go," he tells Lionel, and runs over to Rory.  "Hello there!" he says, unable to help grinning like an idiot.  "Fancy meeting you here."

 

"Hi, Erol," says Rory, his face mostly blank.  He looks a little mixed-up.  "How're you doing?"

 

"Not bad, not bad," Erol says, and then leans in closer to Rory, putting a hand behind Rory's back to guide him toward the door.  Rory flinches, and Erol removes his hand, remembering he's only just met Rory, he should watch himself so as not to be too physical with him.  They go in and start to walk down the stairs.  "What brings you here?"

 

"Love the band," says Rory, looking a little bit happier.  "I've played _Love's Labors Lost_ on cassette about fifteen hundred times."  Ah, Erol knew he could count on Rory!  World's best musical taste.  He has a feeling their music collections are near exact duplicates of each other.  Rory turns to Erol, looking up, making his nose go even mousier and pointier than usual.  "And you?  Dating Lionel 'Flaming' Fleming, are you?"  Erol reels back.

 

"Oh, God, no!"  He laughs a bit at his own reaction.  "Sorry," he says a bit sheepishly, "But the thought of sitting through another session of his take on sexual congress makes me want to kill myself."

 

Despite the explanation, Rory looks even more confused.  His thin eyebrows knit together.   He looks over his shoulder for a split second, as if he's hoping to escape.  

 

"And yet you still want to see the band?" says Rory.  "You wouldn't feel odd?"

 

"Well of course, that's what I'm here for!"  Erol grins and is about to clap Rory on the back when he remembers that Rory apparently doesn't like being touched.  "I mean," he says, "Sure I've always wanted to go home with him a little bit, but the real reason was 'cause I know I'm getting promotion out of it."

 

"I don't like the sound of that," says Rory nervously.

 

"Well, it is kind of like prostituting myself," Erol admits.  "I guess."  

 

The room starts to fill up with people; the band's equipment is almost entirely set up, and Chris Vain and bassist Sherri Long are tuning their instruments, while Richard the drummer tightens the skin on the toms.  

 

"Hey," Rory says loudly, and Erol looks around to see who he's talking to at which point he realizes Rory is just talking to him.  "Do you think mumble mumble mumble?"

 

"What?" says Erol, leaning in closer.

 

"Do you think I could crash at yours again?" Rory says.  "Tell your parents they don't have to do the whole breakfast thing."  He looks and sounds oddly like he's reading a script.  

 

"Sure thing," says Erol anyway.  He would be thrilled to.  He's been thinking all week about what records he would play for Rory the next time he was over, if there was a next time.  The thing is, he thinks as the band starts to play, he's really unusually fond of Rory.  The implication that Rory's refusal to sleep with him might have made him even more interesting to Erol kind of bothers him, but the main thing, definitely the main thing, was music.  Most of the people he knows in this music scene are like Lionel.  Older gay men who want to return to the 1970s aesthetic.  Well, Erol barely remembers the 1970s as he was only _born_ right in the middle of them.  Rory, like himself, seems to be stumbling light-heartedly into glory.

 

And speaking of glory, the Charming Thieves are glorious.  And charming as ever.  Erol is a bit put off Lionel now, but he's still nice to look at, and so are the other three.  Oh, stop being shallow, he tells himself.  There's plenty else to enjoy.  The music is loud, and rude, and raucous.  Rory, the sweet thing, is singing along with every song, including the covers.  By the end of the show, having had a couple of drinks, Erol is joining in, and he and Rory keep grinning at each other.

 

Unlike Suede, the Thieves finish up bright and early at nine-thirty, and Erol feels a little bit pleased with himself because he knows Rory wants to stay at his place now because _he's_ there, obviously not just because he doesn't want to ride back to Richmond station.  

 

\---

 

They take the bus back to Erol's, and they lie around in Erol's room listening to records and finishing off Erol's rice.  Rory fidgets, messes his hair up, plays with his shirt collar until it's limp and wrinkled.  Erol wishes he could fix whatever's bothering Rory, but he knows it's in Rory's head and Rory has to deal with it himself.

 

Then again, something is bothering him too.  That something being Rory.  Because he just doesn't _get_ Rory.  Rory won't sleep with him, Rory won't let Erol touch him, and yet Rory was perfectly content to let Erol kiss him—even kiss back a little—and hold Rory in his arms and sleep.  Maybe Rory is just confused.  And you shouldn't get mixed up with people who are going to project all that angst onto you.  But Rory is so interesting, and new.  Erol just wishes he weren't _so_ wonderful because maybe then he wouldn't want to kiss Rory's neck right where his shirt collar meets his skin.  

 

He wants to, but he won't.

 

"This is depressing the hell out of me," he says and switches out the current record he has on (Bauhaus) for Devo, because you can't be sad listening to Devo.  

 

"Seriously?" says Rory.

 

"Seriously what?"

 

"Devo," says Rory.  He laughs a little, almost a giggle, and then stands up, brushing off his jeans.  "This was my entire childhood.  I mean, my mum and dad have embarrassing home video of me shaking it in my living room to Devo."  He starts to shake his shoulders a little bit.  "You've got to dance to Devo." 

 

"I don't dance," says Erol.  He is happy enough to watch Rory dance, though.   And he does.  Rory's dancing is a little awkward, because Rory is all skinny legs and gangly arms, but it's kind of a glorious thing to watch.  Rory is just into it the way no one ever seems to be into anything, like his entire body and soul is possessed by "Time Out For Fun" for the time being, and there is nothing else in his world.  Loads of people can get themselves into music like this, but not if it's Devo.  Rory is clearly one of a kind.

 

The song ends and Rory flops over backwards onto Erol's bed.  

 

"I can't believe you didn't dance," he says.

 

"Too busy watching you," Erol murmurs.  Rory scoffs and rolls his eyes.  "What?  It was entertaining."

 

"Oh, so you weren't admiring my fit body," Rory says with a little laugh.

 

"Well, a bit of that too," Erol admits.

 

"Really if you want fit bodies to admire, I'm not your go-to guy," says Rory.  

 

"Don't say that sort of thing," Erol says warningly.  "I'm allergic to self-deprecation.  Makes me break out in hives."  He scratches the back of his neck as if to further his point.

 

"Ooh, me too, to be honest," says Rory.  "I start thinking about how other people are better than me at one thing or another, and then the next thing I know I'm in bed with hay fever.  Really ought to stop that." 

 

Erol exhales.  The tension in the room has gone slack.  Finally he can breathe.

 

\---

 

They pass the rest of the night in a similar fashion, until half three when they both fall asleep, Rory on the bed and Erol on the floor.  When Erol wakes up with his face pressed into the carpet, leaving indentations on his cheeks, Rory is already up, kneeling on the floor listening to Erol's record player with headphones on.  Imagine that.  Just two nights spent here and already he's made himself at home.

 

Breakfast is less formal; Erol's father is working extra hours and so his mother fed herself and him at some ungodly hour in the morning while the two boys were still sound asleep.  As such, they just scrounge around in the kitchen while Erol's mother looks worried and flips through television channels.  Part of Erol still worries whenever he sees his mother like this.  An even smaller part of Erol is telling him to bury his face in Rory's Richmond FC top.  But he doesn't listen.

 

Rory's just so comfortable to him, though, he thinks as they go back up the stairs.  Maybe this is what having a proper friend feels like.

 

As Rory is leaving, Erol says he's going to lend Rory some music, and fills a small bag with seven-inches and cassettes.  

 

"Legend," Rory mutters, taking the bag and glancing toward the door like he's not sure if it's okay to leave.  "I suppose I'll go now," he says, but still stays put.  Erol sidesteps to remove himself from Rory's path to the door, but Rory sort of follows him, saying "Wait, I was just wondering if I could, maybe--"

 

And then Rory kisses him.  

 

He's sure Rory started it.  At first it's nothing but a press of lips to lips, and then their mouths are opening and Rory bends back and Erol bends forward, deepening the kiss.  And then they both pull back, and smile wide at each other, and Rory leaves.

 

\---

 

This goes on for a while.  Pretty soon, Rory and Erol have each other's numbers and are calling to plan out which shows the other is going to.  Erol is DJing at clubs more often these days, and Rory starts showing up even when Erol only gets notified a couple of days before and forgets to tell him.  He stands right in front of the decks and sometimes leans over and yells at Erol about what track to put on next.  Erol wouldn't tolerate this behavior from anyone else, but with Rory it's, well, infuriatingly fantastic, because he's usually right.

 

They always go back to Erol's.  The only time Erol has been at Rory's is when he's just standing at the bottom of the stairs while Rory fetches records from his room.  He gets the impression that Rory is worried about his parents guessing what's going on between the two of them.  Erol's parents, as far as Erol can tell, seem to tolerate Erol's behavior but prefer not to hear about or see any of it directly.  He is getting a picture of Rory's parents as somewhat Puritan; they're certainly very traditional in the way they seem to want conventional lives for their sons.  Rory talks sometimes about how coming to Erol's house is like an escape from the ordinary world.  So every time, it's Erol's house.

 

Every time, they kiss before Rory leaves.  Sometimes Erol starts it, sometimes Rory does.  They don't talk about it.  Erol is afraid that if he did, Rory would run away.  

 

Every time, it gets a bit further.  Hands under shirts, hands in jeans, hands roaming just about everywhere.  One day Erol has his hand on Rory's zipper.  Rory starts to shift away.

 

"Would you stay just fifteen minutes?  Just five minutes?" says Erol.  Rory looks at him with an unreadable expression.

 

"Why not," he says.  Erol slips Rory's jeans and pants down to his feet and puts his mouth over Rory's cock.  Rory puts his hands in Erol's hair; it's getting so long, Erol realizes, that Rory can probably pretend Erol is a girl if he wants to.  But when Rory nudges Erol's chin with his knee, it's "Erol" he says, and "Erol!" again when Erol doesn't take his mouth off Rory.  Erol reaches up and touches Rory's hand with his own to tell him he understands, and he lets Rory come in his mouth.  The combination of that and Rory's utterly blissful expression make Erol already start to wet his underwear.  

 

Rory doesn't seem to mind about where Erol's mouth has been because he draws Erol back up to him and kisses him deeply.  Maybe it doesn't bother him.  Maybe he's kissed other people with his come in their mouths.  Erol loves the way he doesn't give a shit.  Rory's hand is pushing down between them to rub against Erol's cock through his jeans.  

 

"Is this okay?" he asks Erol, licking his lips.  "Is this good?"

 

"Oh fuck it Rory, I'm coming," Erol says, because he is, because his cock is twitching and spreading liquid all across the front of his trousers, making Rory's hand sticky even as he keeps rubbing it over Erol's crotch.  Erol leans forward into Rory, opening his mouth over Rory's neck and kissing the hot skin.  Rory wraps his arms around Erol and lets the two of them fall over onto the bed.

 

"Jesus Christ," says Rory.

 

"I know," says Erol.  They lie there for a moment.

  
"My shirt's all damp," Rory says miserably.  

 

"You can borrow one of mine," says Erol.

 

"But you wear all those horribly tight girls' tops.  I'd look like a massive poof in them," Rory says.  Erol bites back a snide remark.  "I mean, _you_ don't," Rory says.

 

"Really?"

 

"No, you just look like a girl."  

 

"Oh, thank you."  The two of them climb off the bed and Erol lends Rory one of his largest T-shirts.  Rory tucks it into the front of his jeans as he's dressing.  "You realize now you look even more of a massive poof," says Erol, trying not to laugh.  

 

"Duly noted."  Rory puts on his jacket.  "See you Thursday, then."

 

"Right, Thursday."

 

\---

\---

 

Rory meets Mae at a party.  He doesn't go to a lot of parties, and neither, she confesses, does she.  That makes the two of them commiserators.  He found her on the couch, her pretty dark curls nearly covering her round face, and offered her a drink.  She refused the drink but said she liked his _Velvet Underground and Nico_ T-shirt.

 

It's not really a conversation, this thing they're having.  It's almost as if they're having two semi-related but mostly separate conversations, but maybe that's the way it works sometimes.

 

"I hate going to parties on Wednesdays," Mae says.  She has a high, light voice, the sort you might not even notice unless you tried.  "I just think Wednesday is the most depressing day of the week, because you realize you've still got half the week to go."

 

"I just wish it were a Thursday.  I'm seeing my mate DJ tomorrow."  Rory is looking forward to the sort of night out he's accustomed to, with loud music and no time for chats or histrionics.

 

"I've just been to the most fantastic club last weekend," says Mae, stars almost visible in her eyes.  "Heard loads of stuff I love."

 

"Really I only go to clubs when my mate's playing," Rory admits.  "Maybe I should get out more."

 

"Maybe," she says.  " _You'd_ probably like Going Underground."

 

"My mate plays it."

 

"Perfect!" Mae squeals.  She laughs out loud, leans over, and kisses him.  

 

"What was that for?" Rory asks.

 

"I dunno," Mae says, "But didn't you like it?"

 

"Yes," Rory covers.  "Of course.  I just wanted to know so I could do whatever it was again."  She scoots closer to him, slings an arm around his neck.

 

"Just keep on being you," she says, and then, "Let's get a cab."

 

Rory does call the two of them a cab, and he decides he'll pay as well.  It's the gentlemanly thing to do.  Mae keeps falling over on his shoulder, and he feels extremely uncomfortable.  She's lovely, but drunk.  That's probably why she wouldn't let him serve her another drink.  Rory can't go home with her in good faith.  She'll thank him someday.  

 

He walks her to her house, ameliorates an angry father in the kitchen, gets the coldest farewell imaginable, and has to ride home alone all across London.  In the cab he finds himself thinking, aren't you supposed to do this sort of thing for someone you care about?

 

"Pardon," he says at a red light to the cab driver, who looks vaguely Middle Eastern.  He turns around.  "Where's the name Alkan from?"

 

"I don't know," says the driver.  "Alkan who?"

 

"Erol Alkan?"

 

"It's Turkish," he says and looks back at the road.  Rory feels like Erol would probably understand, for some reason.  He feels like Erol would understand just about anything.

 

\---

 

Erol gets his own place not far from where his parents live.  With great delight Rory watches as the small empty cube of a flat transforms into what Erol would later call 'a map of the inside of my brain'.  There are records absolutely everywhere, including the kitchen, which is also filled with boxes of pasta, bottles of oil, and jars of spices.  Pieces of paper, magazines, and electronic equipment lie all over the place, moved about whenever Erol remembers to pay them any attention.  

 

This all means that Rory can go over whenever he wants, stay as long as he wants, and make as much noise as he wants playing his and Erol's records.  They scavenge a cheap television set and a VCR so they can watch tapes; Erol can't possibly afford cable.  

 

Right now they're listening to a tape of music videos compiled by a friend of Erol's.

 

"This is great, isn't it?" says Erol.

 

"No, it's shit," says Rory, because it is shit, and because Erol's grin shows he's obviously been taking the piss.

 

"Rubbish," he agrees.  "Really rubbish."  

 

"Erol," says Rory, pulling his knees in to his chest.  "How do you pull girls who aren't drunk?"  Erol gives him a look.  "Honestly, Erol, I already told you about Mae, and then there was this other girl, Catherine, who was just beautiful but she wouldn't hardly look at me."

 

"I don't know much about pulling girls," Erol mutters, looking intently at the television.  

 

"Girls love you," says Rory.

 

"D'you know why, it's because I don't pose a threat," he explains.

 

"And I do, then?"  Rory gestures at his small frame, his current choice of attire (a sweater and a ratty T-shirt).  

 

"Well you're apparently attracted to them," Erol says.

 

"Fair enough."  This isn't really where Rory wanted this conversation to go.  Of course, when he tries to figure out where he _did_ want the conversation to go, he realizes he kind of fantasized about Erol _showing_ him what he ought to do with girls, and that's just a bit uncomfortable and probably all kinds of wrong.  "Why'd you say apparently?"

 

"I don't know about you, Rory," says Erol.  "You're so weird."

 

"Is it a problem?"

 

"Never," says Erol.  "I think I like that about you.  I think I like how you have this sort of, you have a thing and it's Rory-ness."  Echoes of Mae's 'just keep on being you'.  Rory wonders if he's suddenly trapped in one of those children's television programs where the moral is to always be yourself and embrace the diversity in all of us—but then he's getting distracted, because Erol has made his way over to Rory's chair and is kissing the side of Rory's chin.  "But see," he says, his lips close to Rory's face, "You don't need to worry about pulling."

 

Rory wonders for a moment if maybe this isn't what it's like to have something concrete and lasting.  He feels like he should be too young for this.  He feels like he should be too young for Erol's hand slipping down his stomach and into his trousers.  He feels like he should be too young for Erol's lips on his lips.

 

He feels like he should be too young, but he knows he's just old enough.

 

\---

 

And when it's over, and Erol is collapsed exhausted on the bed, Rory just feels sore and extremely unsure of a lot of things.  He had never really thought about how the whole physical aspect of the thing worked before.  Well, that is, he knew what went where and all that, but he didn't know about—well, he doesn't really want to dwell on it.  

 

Rory isn't really sure what the next step is.  He supposes maybe to Erol it's all the same, but as far as he has concerned this is the first time Erol has ever _fucked_ him.  He wanted Erol to do it, but he wasn't really thinking that much about the fact that Erol's dick is really big.  It isn't so big when it's not hard, which Rory actually has seen because Erol sometimes showers while Rory is over and walks around the flat naked before he finds clean clothes in one of the numerous piles of things.  Maybe Erol thinks Rory likes that.  Maybe he's right.

 

Anyway, Rory kind of wonders, as he's lying on Erol's bed looking at the ceiling, if maybe people should stop going on about how they wish their dicks were bigger.  

 

Not long after he sleeps, his nose buried in Erol's hair because in one way or another he feels Erol can protect him from himself.

 

\---

 

Rory doesn't emerge from his room for a while.  He receives Erol's calls and pleads schoolwork, as uncomfortable as it is when Erol says "Rory, I know this has to do with me," and Rory says, "Yes, but I'm going to keep saying I have schoolwork until I get my head sorted," and hangs up.  He spends his time listening to records on his turntable and one of Erol's rather than actually doing his schoolwork.  There is an open maths book on his desk for when he gets too frustrated with mixing or needs to keep up appearances.

 

Eventually, Rory's brothers drag him out of the house for a neighborhood game of football.  Rory plays right forward.  He has decided this is his destiny.  There is nothing better than the smell of fresh grass kicked up by his trainers, the sound of the goal net swishing when the ball hits it.  It doesn't happen often, because the goalkeeper is a talented young man of about twice Rory's size, but that just makes Rory's victories sweeter.  

 

By the time he returns to the house, grass stains on his knees and a furious red burning in his cheeks from the fresh air and sunshine, Rory realizes he does in fact want to see Erol again.  

 

\---

 

He shows up at Erol's flat that evening without calling ahead, afraid that Erol would talk him into admitting things he didn't want to admit.  Since Erol is older than him, there is a certain degree of power Erol wields, whether he's intending it or not.  When no one answers the door, Rory fears for a moment that Erol isn't in, or that – worse yet – he doesn't want to see Rory himself.

 

But no, there's Erol, familiar dark circles hanging under his eyes, his hair curling up at the ends in opposite directions.  Just seeing him, Rory feels warmed throughout.    

 

"Hello stranger," says Erol, moving aside to let Rory in.  Rory squeezes past Erol and steps into the front room, nearly tripping over a small, white, soft thing.

 

"What the hell is this?" says Rory, nudging the white ball with his toe.  It lifts a pointy head, mews at him, and then rubs against his ankle.  "Oh."  He bends down and pats the kitten on the head.  "Hello there."

 

"If you'll even believe it, my parents dumped him on me.  Said he showed up on Holloway, crying all night.  And after Mum brought him round he decided to stay."  Erol flops down onto the couch.  "Do you have any idea how expensive it is to feed a kitten?  I'm going to need to do two, three nights a week to take care of the poor sod."  Rory picks up the kitten, which paws interestedly at his collar.

 

"I think he likes me," says Rory.

 

"You should feel flattered, he hates almost everyone else he's met," Erol says with a laugh.  Rory remembers a friend of his once saying she wouldn't date anyone her cat didn't trust.  So, there.  This is probably just more proof that there's something between him and Erol.  Something more than just messing around.  "So you're back," Erol continues, as if he's reading Rory's thoughts.  Rory almost wishes Erol could read his thoughts, just to get all this business over with.

 

"I'm back," Rory echoes lamely.

 

"Good," says Erol.  He breaks into a wide smile.  "Where are my records?"

 

"Dog ate 'em," says Rory with a smirk.

 

"I'll be expecting full payment within a week," Erol continues the banter.

 

"Can't," Rory says.  He shrugs.  "I'll have to work to make it up.  Clean your kitchen?  God knows it needs it."

 

"I wouldn't say that, considering the state _your_ room is in."

 

"Point taken.  I'm pretty useless at anything other than football and sorting through bargain bins."

 

"I can think of one thing," says Erol, and Rory is about to protest that Erol is being a pervert and not to mention a bastard.  But then Erol says, "You understand music the way I do.  So I hope you keep coming back."

 

\---

 

Rory does a bit of the other thing he's good at that night, and then Erol does a bit of what he's good at as well, and this time Rory asks fewer questions of himself because he's fairly sure that what he has is something he doesn't want to spoil.

 

\---

 

Mae shows up at some of the same clubs as Rory and soon she talks to him, looking like it took a while for her to gather up the courage.  They're sitting on a bench outside, in Rory's case because the current DJ is shit and Erol is in the back putting his own set together.

 

"I'm seeing someone," is what she says.

 

"I might also be," says Rory, not phased by this at all.

 

"Might?  How's that?"  Mae actually looks concerned, like the idea of maybe but not for sure seeing someone is dangerous and not something she'd wish on anyone

 

"Well, it's like," says Rory.  He pauses to wipe his face.  He's a little drunk.  Hurrah for fake IDs.  "We've been sleeping together for a while."  Mae raises her eyebrows.

 

"Friends with benefits, then?"

 

"I guess?"  Rory sighs.  "But I mean, I don't know.  He's just--"  And Rory realizes he's probably made a mistake.  "I mean, _she_ , I mean..."  Mae puts her arm around Rory's shoulders and he shrugs her off.  "Mae, don't!  He might see."

 

"He's here?"  And then she starts laughing, nearly cramming her fist into her mouth to make herself stop.  "No wonder you wouldn't shut up about your DJ mate!"

 

"Be quiet!" Rory whispers harshly.  "I don't exactly want to go broadcasting it everywhere."

 

"Wow," Mae says, much quieter now.  "I had a feeling about that Erol, but I never figured..."  She smiles.  "I don't mind, though.  I always wanted to have a gay friend."  Rory hopes he can attribute that line to drunkenness.  It's not the sort of thing he wants to hear all the time.

 

"I'm not gay," says Rory.

 

"Sure, bisexual, whatever," she says, still smiling.

 

"I'm not bisexual."  Rory is a little cross now.  It's just Erol I like, he thinks.

 

"Oh."  Mae looks as though she doesn't completely believe him.  

 

And for a moment, Rory knows exactly how he can prove it.  He can lean over and kiss Mae on the lips.  Forget whoever she's seeing.  Mae is really lovely, and despite the fact that she can be a bit of a fool when she's had too much to drink, Rory has a feeling the two of them have a lot in common and could get along very well.  

 

There could be other kisses in the future.  It would start with stolen kisses at clubs, because when you're dancing and possibly a little tipsy then it makes you brave (because it's in public) but it's also intimate and secret (because no one is really paying attention).  It would go on to more kisses in the cab.  The cab driver would scold them but feel a little bit happy because young love can be really nice.  Rory wouldn't tell Mae where he lived and so he'd always have the cabbie drop her off first and then take him home.  Mae would think it sweet, but odd because Rory wasn't paying for her ride, just riding along with her.  Rory would eventually admit that he was flat broke but that he lived in Richmond so he was actually paying a great deal more for the cab than he ought to be.  She would find it utterly romantic, in a 'Rory-like' way.  

 

They'd start going out after that.  Not just to clubs.  To restaurants and films.  Rory would get a job, probably at a shop, so that he could afford to take Mae out more often.  He'd have to get his hair cut.  Mae, he decides, would find that funny and mock him mercilessly.  But secretly she'd be pleased because it meant her parents would be more impressed with him.  They'd go to dinner at each other's houses.  Rory's brothers would try to give him shit 'advice' and he would throw pillows at them.  Rory's dad would be proud of him.  Rory's mother would not-so-subtly remind him to use protection the way she always reminds his older brothers.  And sometimes Mae would come back with Rory after going to a gig or to a club, and Rory would get his turntables out and play records--

 

play _Erol's_ records, on _Erol's_ turntable--

 

"I have to go," Rory says, inching away from her down the bench.  Mae looks concerned.  Her high arching eyebrows start to meet in the middle.  "I'm feeling a bit off.  I'll see you around."

 

"Goodbye Rory," Mae says, her tone making it sound almost like a sad song.  Goodbye Rory, goodbye.  Rory runs, like he's running away.  Part of him is afraid that the future he just imagined will catch up with him, like maybe it's lurking in every shadowy corner, because it would just be so _easy_ \--

 

Rory gets on a bus and presses his forehead to the window.  At this point not even the Black Plague could scare him any worse.

 

\---

 

When he gets home, Rory's parents are still up watching the television.  His mother is knitting.  For a second he wants to squeeze himself between them the way he would have done as a small child after having had a nightmare, but he realizes he's nearly seventeen and that's no longer really an option.

 

"Rory?" his mum says.  "It's early, for you, isn't it?"

 

"I'm not feeling well," he says, and coughs into the crook of his arm to further his point.  He then sniffles to try and make it even more obvious.  "I think I'll go to bed.  Rather tired.  Et cetera.  Going to sleep in tomorrow."

 

"Good idea," says his dad.  "A good night's sleep usually takes care of all that et cetera for you.  Much better than bouncing around in dance clubs doing the Twist or whatever it is people are doing these days."  Usually Rory would laugh at that sort of comment but he just feels miserable, jumpy and twisty and stomachache-y.  

 

"Do you want me to get you an extra blanket?" says his mum.

 

"That's all right," he says, and goes up to his room to change into pyjamas and bury himself under his blanket.

 

Erol.

 

Can't get Erol out of his head.

 

So he's going to have to admit it.

 

He "really, really likes" Erol.  He rather loves Erol.  He's terrified of the thought of being with anyone who isn't Erol.  Erol has gorgeous dark eyes and a laugh that might actually end wars.  Erol understands music like no one else does, _cares_ infinitely about the exact moment in time when he takes one record off his headphones and gives it to the dancing crowd like a benediction.  Erol likes to make Rory smile, feels free to walk around naked in front of Rory with that gigantic great thing of a penis hanging between his legs, is always careful to make sure Rory is happy, is always happy if Rory is happy, makes Rory happy effortlessly.  

 

Isn't that basically, Rory thinks, and kind of wishes he could scrape his own brains out of his head, like having a relationship with someone?

 

What are you supposed to do if you have a relationship with someone who is both the same sex as you are and also older than you?  Rory never intended to do this in his whole life.  But on the other hand he's terrified of anything else.  But on the other other hand, which, he supposes, means he now has three hands—or maybe he's just back in the first hand already—he's terrified of this.  Of what people will think.  Of having to keep everything a secret.  Of the very finality of it all, the feeling that this could already be a relationship and that maybe they were imprinted on each other's lives forever.  Of the way he loves Erol more than just about anything else in his life right now.

 

Which means, he realizes with a sudden bolt of nausea, there is not a single possible future for Rory of which he is not terrified.

 

\---

 

Rory sleeps fitfully.  At some point he dimly registers his mum coming in, pressing her cool hand to his forehead, and putting a blanket on top of him.  After that he just sleeps.

 

\---

 

The next morning Rory wakes up and the first thought in his head is the following: oh fuck bollocks cock piss arse and _shit_ I left before Erol came on and I need to phone him to apologize immediately.  He's about to bound across the floor to go downstairs and fetch the telephone when he hears his name from the floor below.  

 

When Rory was very young his parents always used to talk about him when they thought he was asleep.  They would talk about his brothers, too, but he would find that boring and only listen in when it was specifically scandalous, such as when Jamie was in trouble at school for having thrown a plastic cooking pot at a girl in his class.  

 

He has, therefore, developed a keen ability to eavesdrop.  He puts his ear to the floor.

 

"...so hard for him."  Mum.

 

"I don't know what we should do about it.  Maybe it's just a phase he'll grow out of.  After all, it's clear that boy is an influence on him," says his dad.

 

"It's clear," says his mum, "that he's extremely fond of that boy."

 

Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck.

 

"I just don't know what to do, Ellen," his dad says, sounding very frustrated.  

 

"Think about it, Arthur.  He's our son.  We can't fault him for being who he is."

 

"It's just—Ellen, I mean, I'm not opposed to it.  You know I vote Labour and all, but it's different when it's our son."  Fuck again.  Double fuck.  Fuck with knobs on.  "I mean, Ellen, I'm not—I'm frightened for him.  I'm seen people do really awful things—really violent things to other people.  And I worry if it's something we've done wrong."

 

"Arthur, please."

 

"I know, Ellen, I know."  Rory has already counted four 'Ellen's and two 'Arthur's.  This is not a good sign.  

 

"I'm frightened too, Arthur," Rory's mum says finally with a sigh.  He hears footsteps on the kitchen floor, probably his dad going to put his arm around his mum.  Rory's stomach twists a little bit.  Would Erol put his arm around Rory like that?  Rory thinks he would do.  "I didn't expect we'd have to deal with this.  But we have to give him a chance."

 

"Give who a chance?  I'll give Rory every chance in the damn world," says Rory's dad, "Because he _is_ my son."

 

"I meant give that—give Erol a chance.  He does seem a nice boy."

 

"Ah..."

 

"Have him round for dinner or something.  I mean, I don't want Rory to have to hide around us."  

 

"Yes, I suppose you're right, Ellen.  I just--"

 

"I know, Arthur, I know."  

 

At that point, Rory can no longer hear the conversation.  He pushes himself to his feet, swallows hard to keep from crying and from laughing too loud, and heads down the stairs to the kitchen.

 

\---

\---

 

Rory has left.

 

He's simply no longer there.

 

Erol saw him go outside with Mae Fitzpatrick whom he knows Rory at least one time had a bit of a thing for.  Except Mae is back, without Rory in tow, swaying to the canned music that is playing in between DJ sets while Erol gets his records in order.  He wonders for a moment if Rory has somehow miraculously turned Mae down again.  In Erol's experience, Mae usually gets what she wants, if what she wants isn't gay.

 

Then again, he saw her with a young man the other day.  It's not someone he knows this time—how he knows Mae, of course, is because she used to be halfheartedly dating one of Erol's few straight friends.  So he probably doesn't have to worry about her.  

 

He thinks it could be tempting, though, for Rory, if she ever does forget the boy she's currently smitten with.  Mae is so pretty, and Rory so frightened of being gay.  Erol kind of wishes Rory would just admit it.  Rory will swear to not liking the cock, but when confronted with it, he just says yes and more yes.  

 

It's not just, Erol thinks guiltily, for Rory's own benefit that he hopes this.  Yes, certainly it would be a relief for Rory to be able to be open about all that, but moreover then Erol could get done with all this furtive kissing and fucking in his flat and pretending the rest of the time that they were just good friends.  

 

Erol puts on the first record.  Culture Club and "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?" 

 

He kind of likes the way that this is a one-sided conversation with Rory.  He realizes hopelessly that everything he is going to play tonight is going to remind him of Rory.  Rory, he knows, doesn't really want to hurt him.  He's just confused.  And he's always sweet, polite to Erol's parents, liberal with kisses, content to sleep with his head tucked under Erol's chin.  It almost feels like Erol is protecting him when he does that.  When really it's Erol that needs protection.  Protection from turning into a wreck of a human being, from selling himself into sex slavery to get gig spots, obsessing over unreal androgynous pop singers.  He could be obsessing over Rory.  He _is_ obsessing over Rory.

 

Next song, obvious.  The Cars, "This Could Be Love."

 

There are still a lot of things he doesn't know about Rory, of course.  He's just seen glimpses of Rory's parents, who are English and all soft edges and seem very nice.  He knows that Rory has three brothers although sometimes from the way Rory talks about it it sounds like he has tonnes of brothers, that his house is just overflowing with Phillips boys.  Right, he knows Rory's surname is Phillips.  Very English.  He likes that Rory is so English.  It anchors Erol better to England, when sometimes he still feels like for all his pop culture absorption his only real claim to English citizenship (that he was born here) is tentative at best, that he's always going to feel like an alien.

 

Shit, it's winding down.  Feeling like an alien, feeling like a freak.  Rick James, "Super Freak"?  Hell no.  David Bowie, "I'm Afraid of Americans"?  Close enough.

 

The thing Erol is most afraid of is telling Rory how he feels.  He's afraid Rory will freak out.  He's afraid Rory will say no.  He's afraid he'll somehow hurt Rory—he's the one who's older, he's the one who might be pushing Rory into this relationship, he's the one who might be twisting Rory's brain.  Maybe Rory really is normally exactly who he thinks he is.  Maybe Erol is trying too hard to make him into something.  But maybe he's not.  Maybe he's all Erol's been dreaming of.

 

The next song is coming up fast.  He's getting too distracted.  He really wants "Gimme Danger" by Iggy and the Stooges but it refuses to mix in right.  He scrambles for something similar.  Madonna.  Oh Lord.  "Beautiful Stranger."  

 

And then they're flowing into his head, a river of ideas, songs that somehow manage to mesh with each other at his fingers.  He coaxes them to.  Donna Summer.  "I Feel Love".  New York Dolls.  "Looking for a Kiss."  Manic Street Preachers.  "Crucifix Kiss."  _Fall in love, fall in love with me, nail a crucifix down to your soul._   New Order.  "Blue Monday".  The Smiths.  "How Soon Is Now" (and only the long version will do).  Before he gets too sad, he needs Devo, it has to be Devo.  He can't fit in "Whip It", but "That's Good" will do it.  Erol can think of a specific good thing that he wants.  That good thing really should be here, dancing to Devo right now, but he's not sure he'd be ready for Rory to know how deep Erol's feelings are.  

 

Talking Heads.  "Take Me to the River." Now Erol can't stop smiling as he puts the needle on Earth Wind and Fire's "Let's Groove", thinking of how Rory might dance to that disco bassline.  Keeping in with this slightly cheesy, orchestral theme the next track has got to be ELO.  "Strange Magic"?  No, the intro's all wrong.  "Livin' Thing," there we go.  He lets it play out, hardly even touching the faders.  _It's a livin' thing, it's a terrible thing to lose._

 

To finish off he throws down Neu's "Fur Immer".  He leans back and basks in the golden chords that repeat over and over for nearly eleven minutes, building to climaxes, bursting, and drawing back.  The river has turned to an ocean.  The waves calm him.  He's going under, drowning in sound.  It feels like utter bliss.

 

\---

 

The next morning someone rings his buzzer at ten.  Ten in the morning on a Saturday is a time when small children and farm people are awake.  Erol is not.  Not at all.

 

"Fark orf," Erol slurs into the intercom and then stumbles back to bed.  The buzzer goes off again.  Back into the living room.  "Didn't I just tell you to fuck off?"

 

"Erol, you utter cock, it's Rory!" comes a familiar voice, crackling, from the other side.  "Is that how you usually greet people?"

 

"Get up here, you fucker," says Erol, "And yes, if it's ten in the fucking morning I do."  

 

Erol is confused.  Just utterly confused.  There it is, ten AM, and there's a tousle-haired young boy standing in his doorway with spikes on.

 

"Rory," he says, dragging out the vowel.  "Why the hell are you in my flat?  Why are you wearing spikes?  Why is it so bloody early?"

 

"Erm," says Rory.  He walks into Erol's flat and glances around nervously.  "My parents found out about us."  A relieved look appears on his face and he flops down onto a sofa.

 

"Well obviously even if they know we're sleeping together they must not object to it too much, 'cause you're here, aren't you?"  Erol keeps a straight face.  He hasn't decided how to feel yet.

 

"Not that," says Rory.  "I mean, I suppose, they figured something was happening between us and so I've overheard them talking about how to deal with having a gay son."

 

"I thought you weren't gay."  At this point Rory's little mouse nose is poking over the sofa arm and Erol is practically having to stomp his way through the floor to keep himself from going over and kissing it.  It's just so sweet.  

 

"So did I, but I really suppose I am, you know?  In a way."  He rubs the end of his nose.  "Oh.  And the spikes?  I told Dad I was going to play football."  Erol has recently been made aware that Rory is quite serious about football, beyond just wearing club emblems.  "But.  Yeah.  I suppose I am a bit gay because I'm really quite in love with you.  All right," he goes on, while Erol stands there sort of gaping like an idiot.  "Now I've said that, so I think I'm as embarrassed as I can possibly be."

 

"Rory," says Erol.  He has no idea what he should say next.  He'll have to wing it.  "I don't think you should be embarrassed about that."

 

"And Erol," he says, "I would like to know one thing from you.  Do I mean anything to you at all or am I just another notch in the bedpost so to speak?"  

 

"Yes," says Erol.  "You do.  You absolutely--"  He can't really speak anymore.  He goes over to the sofa and somehow squeezes himself onto it next to Rory's warm body, puts his arm around Rory's waist, presses his cheek against Rory's.  

 

"Erol," Rory whines, "You're crushing my skeleton."

 

Nonetheless, they lie there for a moment, Erol practically absorbing Rory's exhaustion.  He just wants to sleep next to Rory, with Rory's heat keeping him warm.  

 

Finally, he rolls off and sits up next to Rory.  Rory sits as well, and Erol snakes an arm around his waist, watching in delight as Rory smiles a twitchy smile.  

 

"My parents know about me too," Erol says.  "I heard them talking about me to a family friend.  I think they'd rather avoid the subject.  They just said something about me 'being the way I am' and how they hoped I'd grow out of it but they figure they'll just deal with it."

 

"Sounds like me."  Rory nestles into Erol's shoulder, making Erol probably the happiest person in the world right now.  He squeezes Rory tighter in his arm.  "So, they want you to come round for dinner some time."

 

Erol frowns.  He's not sure how that would go.  It could be very strange.  He doesn't know if he's ready to do this when they haven't even--

 

"Rory, does this mean we're, like," Erol says. 

 

"Erol, I don't know.  I'm—honestly I'm not sure why I even said anything to you."  He looks away.  "I'm scared, Erol.  Fucking terrified."

 

Erol sighs.  He wants to tell Rory not to be afraid, that everything will be all right, but somehow all he can come up with is, "I'm scared too, Rory."

 

"So what do we, you know, do?" Rory says quietly.  "I mean...."

 

"I want to take you out somewhere," Erol says.  Rory starts.

 

"What if people we know see us?" he says.  "It's such a big deal, this whole thing.  I'm not ready for everyone to be knowing about it."

 

"I'll take you somewhere no one knows about.  Somewhere really special to me.  I'll make it mean something," says Erol.  He already has a place in mind.  Part of him is a little afraid that Rory won't like it.  It's very much Erol's sort of place.  But he wants to introduce Rory to all of the secret parts of London that he loves.  He watches Rory smile, and he thinks there's a sadness in Rory's smile that never really goes away.  How many kisses will it take to get that sadness out of his smile?

 

"Listen," says Rory so softly Erol can hardly hear him.  "I don't want to talk anymore right now."  He presses his mouth against Erol's and neither of them says a word for some time.

 

\---

 

If you didn't know where to look, you wouldn't even notice the Wild Rose as you walked along the street.  Nestled cozily between the bright new façades of a boutique and an ophthalmologist's, it is old and worn thin.  The wooden sign that hangs by the door is small and hard to read; the paint is flaking off the picture of the red rose.  

 

But that's exactly how Rose Wild would like it.  

 

Erol met Rose about two years ago, on one of his first all-nighters.  He'd wandered the streets of Central London with a migraine and smudged kohl eyeliner, half-crazed, looking for a window with a light on.  At last before anything unfortunate could have befallen him, an acquaintance noticed his tall slumped figure and yanked him into the little café and up the stairs to Rose's one-bedroom flat, where he passed out on the floor.

 

Rose has apparently been a part of London's music scene since before she was even a teenager, escaping the drudgery of housework to listen to the well-dressed acolytes of Lou Reed play violins backwards and dance to the strange rhythms of their songs.  She was around to watch glam rock explode like a firework over the city.  Now nearly forty, Rose is still every bit as much involved.  Her stout figure, shocking-blonde hair and mysterious smile are omnipresent wherever there are enough feathers and glitter to catch her attention, though you'd never guess it from the plain clothes she picks for herself.

 

Erol hears the Wild Rose is even older than she is and that she picked her name for the café's.  Erol hears that Mick Rock once slept on the same Persian rug as he did.  Erol hears that Rose used to be the singer in a band and would shock and delight crowds by being wheeled onto the stage stark naked in a metal cage.  Erol hears that Rose gave David Bowie the idea for one of the songs on _Diamond Dogs_.  Erol hears a lot of things.  One thing he knows for sure is that on a Saturday night at the Wild Rose, there will always be music.

 

"Where is it?" Rory asks.  Erol laughs and picks up his pace, making Rory chase him to the door.  They slip in and find an empty table easily, in the far corner right beneath the neon-lit rose painting on the wall.  The café is quiet but for the sounds of a few other couples or groups of friends chatting over sandwiches, salads, and tea.  Rory reaches for the salt shaker in the center of the table and starts playing with it, pushing it around with his fingers, clearly trying to distract himself.

 

"Rory," says Erol.  "Are you all right?"

 

"I'm nervous," he mutters, but he flashes Erol a quick grin that shows he's excited, too.

 

They order food and chat in what Erol realizes is their own way—Erol talking, being energized over something, and Rory listening, nodding, taking it all in and throwing out an occasional comment or question that shows he's been paying close attention.  It isn't because Rory's nervous, Erol realizes, or because he's afraid to say what he feels, it's just because he likes to observe.  He has three brothers, Erol's sure that factors into it quite a bit, Rory probably never gets the chance to talk at home.  

 

"Erol, is this normal?" Rory says.

 

"Is what normal?"

 

Rory points somewhere behind Erol's head, and Erol turns around.  There are three men with musical instruments entering; there's a violin, an acoustic guitar, and a hurdy-gurdy.  

 

"You lot!" says Rose in her thick Cockney accent, popping out from some hidden corner of the room and rushing toward them.  "Playing music in my establishment again?"  Rory looks a bit worried until she goes on, "Well, you'd better get started, you're bloody well late!"

 

They gather around a table and start to jam on a folk-rock tune Erol has never heard before.  Like iron filings to a magnet, everyone draws closer to them, many of the patrons producing instruments of their own and joining in.  Rose starts dancing with Harry, the other café employee on duty, and soon others are waltzing around the room, laughing and pausing to take sips of their wine.

 

Erol looks over at Rory, who is rapt.  He puts his arm around Rory's shoulders; Rory shrugs it off and then glances at Erol, their faces almost touching in a way that is enough to make the air between them seem to hum with electricity.

 

"Do you want to dance?" says Rory.

 

"I don't dance," Erol protests.  "Didn't I tell you that?"

 

Rory scoffs and turns away for a moment.  The band stops for a moment to have drinks, and then strikes up another waltz so that the dancers can continue.

 

"Erol, you dragged me out to do this against my better judgment," Rory says.  "It scared the hell out of me.  It's the least you could do to dance with me."

 

"I can't dance for shit, Rory, you know that."

 

"Well actually," says Rory, his slightly standoffish look changing to one of superiority, because he realizes he's already winning, "I don't know that, as I've never seen you dance.  And even if we make idiots of ourselves, it's not like, a, anyone we know will remember it, or b, anyone else here is doing a much better job.  They're all a bit happy from all the alcohol, aren't they?"

 

"Fine, you prick, I'll dance with you," Erol agrees, smiling despite himself.  They stand up and Erol puts his arm around Rory's waist.  "I've got no idea what I'm doing."

 

"Then switch your hand," says Rory, clearly holding in laughter.  "I'm going to lead, and you're going to deal with it."

 

The key to waltzing, Erol discovers, is finding the rhythm.  As long as he has a hold on that pulsing _one_ -two-three- _one_ -two-three, it doesn't really matter if he's putting his feet in the right places, Rory is still able to lead him around the room.  After a couple of songs, they switch places, and Erol leads Rory between tables, directly into another couple, and finally back to their original seats as the band segues into a somewhat unconventional Beatles cover.  They wipe the sweat from their faces and to their surprise and delight are presented with vanilla ice cream by Rose herself.  

  
"Enjoy yourselves, pretty things," she chirps and then joins in singing, " _I'd love to turn you on_ ," as the instruments swell into an ear-splitting and yet strangely charming climax.  

 

"I never thought I'd hear John Lennon and bongoes in the same song," says Rory appreciatively.

 

"I bet Lennon would have loved this," Erol muses.

 

"Yeah."  Rory laughs.  "McCartney'd have been utterly confused by it, though."  

 

"I don't understand what more there is to music than a little guitar and some harmony," says Erol, in what he is pretending is a Paul McCartney voice.  (A fake Liverpudlian accent generally communicates that well enough.)  "After all this I think I need to go live on a farm with my wife."  Rory buries his face in his hands.  Erol switches to a John Lennon voice.  "Oh don't be that way, Paul, you just have to open your mind a little.  All you need is love, that and LSD."

 

"Do George Harrison," says Rory.

 

"Ah I'm busy fucking off to India right now, no time for all this arguing, isn't it a pity?" Erol says, being George.  "Why can't we all just be friends?" he says, being Ringo. 

 

"Sounds about right," Rory says, "Octopus's Garden and all that."  He sneaks his spoon into Erol's ice cream, clearly under the illusion that Erol is distracted enough not to notice.  Erol doesn't care though, he decides to let Rory stay blissfully ignorant.  

 

"I really do love the Beatles though," says Erol, and Rory nods, sucking on his spoon.  "Some of what they've done, twenty-five years later, it still sounds absolutely innovative and just incredible.  Like, I've put one of their B-sides or album tracks on in a club, you know, from the White Album or something, and had people asking me if it's some new act, I've had to tell them no, it's the Beatles, and they're just incredulous."  

 

Rory scoots Erol's bowl of ice cream over to his side of the table.

 

"They were just so ahead of their time," Erol goes on, still pretending he doesn't notice Rory.  "I almost want to say that they had some way of predicting the future, but I think it's really just they sort of set the stage for what music was going to be in the next fifty years."

 

"No Devo without the Beatles," says Rory, licking the side of the spoon.  Erol is slightly turned on by that.  "Oh, sorry, I sort of ate your ice cream."

 

"Did you really?" says Erol sarcastically.  Rory smiles, and then the band starts up again, into what sounds like an Eastern European folk dance, the sort of thing Erol's parents have on twelve-inch records crammed into their library shelves.  "Dance again?" he asks Rory, and Rory is quick to comply.

  
It turns out to be the final song.  Erol picks up the tab in his usual way, promising Rose he'll pay her back the entire bill tomorrow.  She doesn't even write it down, just grins and taps the side of her head, saying "It's all in here."  Rory looks a bit disbelieving but impressed, and Rose ruffles his hair before disappearing into the kitchen.  As the musicians pour out the front door, Erol and Rory follow, back into the night city.

 

\---

 

Outside the Wild Rose, London is lit with the eerie glow of artificial lights bouncing back off of clouds.  Erol wants to take Rory all over the city.  He already has a course mapped out in his head.  Rory looks like he might need some coaxing, though; his eyes look tired and he's already getting out his bus schedule.

 

"Have a good time?" Erol asks, nudging Rory in the arm.

 

"Yeah," says Rory.  "That was nice."  He looks up at Erol, but it seems like nothing is going to give in his blank expression.  "I'd like it if we did that again, every once in a while."

 

"I can take you back tomorrow, if you like," says Erol, grinning.  "In fact, I even know some other places I'd like to show you.  I was thinking I'd take you around tonight, but if you're too tired..."

 

"I said, I'd like it if we did that again, every once in a while," says Rory, stuffing his hands into his pockets.  

 

"What's the problem?" asks Erol.

 

"I mean, you don't have to prove anything to me, Erol."  Erol must look extremely confused, which is what he is, because Rory goes on.  "I've got it, we're dating or whatever, but I don't understand why everything has to change now."

 

"Rory, I just want to show you the places I love."

 

"No, you want to do different things because we're being official about this.  I liked everything fine the way it was."  Rory isn't even looking at Erol now.  He's staring off into traffic instead.

 

"I'm not trying to change anything, I just want to go on _dates_ from time to time, is that so horrible?"

 

"Maybe it is," says Rory.  "Maybe this was a bad idea."

 

"You're being an idiot!" Erol shouts, and he finds himself grabbing Rory by the collar and making Rory look him in the eye.  "I don't understand your fucking problem."

 

"You just want everything to be like some perfect thing you imagined and Erol _I can't be it_ ," says Rory, wrenching himself out of Erol's grip.  "I'm just what I am and if you don't like that then you can go to hell for all I care."

 

"You go to hell!  You were having fun, you're just scared now!"  Erol feels his face burn.  "You're just scared to admit you're bloody gay!"

 

"This is _not_ about that," says Rory, "and I don't like you telling me what I think."

 

"Sometimes we need other people to tell us what we think!" Erol says urgently.  "Sometimes other people know _better_ \--"  With a sudden motion, Rory hits Erol in the face.

 

"Erol, shut the hell up, and if you say it again, I'll hit you again," he says.  Erol almost laughs.  Rory is so much smaller than he is, it's almost comical watching Rory try to do this.  "Fuck you," Rory snarls, and punches Erol in the stomach.  All right, _that_ one hurt.  Erol hardly even knows what he's doing, but suddenly the two of them are scrabbling with each other, and it feels oddly satisfying when his fist connects with Rory's face.  

 

"YOU TWO!" bellows Rose's voice from the doorway.  "I'll have none of this fightin' in front of my café, all right then?"  The next thing Erol knows, she's physically pulling them apart and standing between them.  "Erol Alkan, I know you don't have eleven pounds sixty," and it's true, she really did memorize the bill, "And I know you're just going to be in my kitchen washing dishes tomorrow night anyway, so I want the two of you, as punishment for fighting in front of my café, in the back, washing dishes, right NOW.  Erol, you in the main kitchen, and Rory's coming with me to the back room."  She shoves Erol toward the door.  "In!  In!  I ain't waiting!"

 

Erol runs in.  He doesn't want Rory to see him now anyway.  He finds his way to the sink and puts on a pair of rubber gloves, fishing the sponge out of a drawer.  He starts to scrub, and wonders when the night will be over.

 

\---

\---

 

To dull his pain, both physical and mental, Rory wonders to himself about why Rose has two sinks.  Rory has never been in a kitchen with more than one sink.  Her café must get more patronage than most people's cafés do.  It's a nice café, so it seems fairly reasonable that that would be the case.  

 

Rose leads them up a short set of iron stairs, through a back door, across a dark room, and into what turns out to be a toilet.  Rory sees himself in the mirror and realizes it wasn't just the rain, his face is wet because his nose is bleeding.  Rose turns on the tap and Rory washes his face and hands, pinching the bridge of his nose to stop the blood.  

 

"Is it broken?" Rose asks, hands on her hips.

 

"No," says Rory, although it sounds a bit more like 'dough' because he's pinching his nose.  "I used to have fights with my brothers all the time when I was small.  I had it broken properly once..."  Rose snorts and tosses her hair.

 

"Brothers!  You can't live with them, you can't live with them!"  Isn't that supposed to be 'can't live without them'?  "I've got two myself, and three sisters; it was all a bit mad as I'm sure you can imagine."

 

"It's just me and three brothers at home, but that's quite enough for me," says Rory.  Rose leads him out of the toilet and back into the 'back room', which is actually clearly the front room of her flat.  He remembers Erol mentioning that she lived above the café.  Rose sits him down in a chair and then takes a seat in one across from him.  She doesn't say anything, so he keeps going.  

 

"There's William—we call him Bill—he's the oldest, and then Jamie, then me, and then the little one is Archie though really he's not much younger than I am, and he's actually taller."  For some reason, he finds Rose very easy to talk to, even though his main experience with her is of her yelling at him for fighting in front of her café.  And talking distracts him.  "I think I was supposed to have a sister, actually, but she was born dead," says Rory.  He hasn't actually told anyone that before, but it's a thing to say.  "She would have been called Louisa, after my nan, I think.  My other nan, my mum's mum, is called May, but my mum is called May after her.  Everyone just uses her middle name, Ellen."

 

"What's your name again?" Rose asks, as if she's completely ignored everything Rory has just said. 

 

"Rory Phillips, ma'am," says Rory.

 

"Rory, I want you to understand I'm not cross with you," she says.

"You should be," Rory says with a nervous laugh.  "Actually.  I hit Erol first."

 

"That's none of my business.  I just don't want you fighting in--"

 

"In front of your café," he says along with her.  "I know.  And I figured you weren't cross."

 

"I know you boys have to work out your differences with a little violence from time to time," she says.  

 

"Maybe."  Rory's nose has stopped bleeding, and he takes the tissue down. 

 

"Do you want to talk it out with me first?" she asks kindly.  "I know the hardest part with these things is figuring out how you're going to say something to someone without making a mess of it."

 

"Well," says Rory.  "All right."  He actually doesn't want to, at all, but he'd rather talk to Rose right now than talk to Erol.  He really doesn't want to get punched in the nose again.  

 

"Listen, Rory, I don't want you to give up on him," says Rose.  "I've known Erol for a while and he can be stubborn, but he's really brilliant, especially for someone so young."

 

"I'm younger than he is," says Rory under his breath.

 

"He needs someone like you," says Rose.

 

"He doesn't want it though.  He wants someone like—like Lionel Flaming Fleming from the Charming Thieves, someone who already has themself properly figured out and knows the right thing to say and doesn't have to phone their mum every time they're out late."  Rory sighs and buries his face in his hands, wincing from the pain in his nose.  Rose, as it turns out, is doubled over laughing.

 

"You think Lionel Flaming Fleming is Erol's romantic ideal?  Ha, that's a good one Rory, next thing you're going to tell me pigs fly.  I'd lose my dinner if anyone did think Lionel was their perfect spouse."   She pats Rory on the shoulder.  "I'm guessing you don't know Lionel all that well.  If it weren't for his daddy's money and his rich friends he'd be living in a skip or worse, locked up somewhere."

 

"Okay, maybe not like Lionel, then," Rory concedes.  "But—no—you know what he wants, is, he wants a boyfriend that's like, like a _girlfriend_.  And I just want to be like his friend but on top of that let him know that I love him.  I don't want to go on dates and have to worry all the time about doing the right thing at every single moment which is what my brothers always go on and on about and--"  Rory takes a deep breath.  "And it's not for me!  Maybe he thinks just 'cause I've had this oh, boring, ordinary family for all my life, which he wouldn't think it is if he actually agreed to come to my bloody house for once and didn't act like it was so awkward and whatever, that I want to do the same things everyone else does, being in a relationship.  And I don't, I actually don't!  I thought basically the whole reason we started talking about having a relationship and all that was because we really, actually, we already _had_ one, and so now we just know all that's true and we can just not worry."  

 

"Have you ever talked that much in your life?" Rose asks.

 

"No, actually, I have not."  Rory is really tired.  All he wants now is to go home.  But Rose nudges him.

 

"Now go," she says.  "Go down there.  Talk to the boy.  Knock some sense into his idiot head."  Rory rolls his eyes and stands up, wanting to say, you're not my _mum_ , but he realizes that he really has no business talking back to someone who could have easily made him go work in the kitchen all night.  "And say hello to Jamie, and Bill, and Archie, and your mum and dad for me, all right?"  Well, he'll be damned, she was listening after all.

 

\---

 

"I'm sorry," says Rory once he's in the kitchen.  Erol has his back to Rory and he's washing dishes in a sink.  He doesn't turn around.  Fine, Rory thinks, if you want to be that way, go ahead.  Just please don't punch me in the face again.  He sighs.  Time to try again.

 

"I'm sorry I hit you, and I shouldn't have said that about going to dinner.  I really did enjoy it."

 

Erol still doesn't turn around, and Rory is beginning to be a bit upset.  He balls his hands into fists, but he delicately restrains from using them.

 

"I'm sorry I--"

 

"Rory," says Erol in a voice that Rory isn't used to as being Erol's voice at all.  He turns around very slowly.  His face is wet, and his eyes look even redder than they do when he hasn't slept for two full days.  "It's all right, Rory," he says, a little more clearly.

 

"It isn't," says Rory.  "I bollocksed things."  Rory shuffles his feet, realizing he's going to have to talk again.  "I should have thanked you.  I shouldn't have brought that stuff up."

 

"Rory I shouldn't have gotten so upset, and I shouldn't have said those things I said about you.  I love you."  It hangs in the air for a moment.

 

"It's just I didn't want everything to start changing," says Rory.  "I feel like everything—everything—I do with you is just perfect, all the time, and I don't want to lose all the things we did before last Saturday."

 

"I don't either, Rory," says Erol.  "I just want to do the sort of things you do with the person you love because I've never had a chance before."

 

"It's just—ugh—it's just I'm worried I'm going to have to start feeling guilty if I don't do the same sorts of things for you, take you to dinner and show you new places and all the things I can't do 'cause I don't know London like you do."

 

"Maybe you could just...try," says Erol.  Rory feels his stomach clench.

 

"You're right.  I could do that."  Relationships do actually take work.  He's heard people say that before.  He guesses it's true.

 

"I mean, I'm not going to scrutinize you or anything," says Erol, "I just like learning about all the things you love.  I want to know more about you."

 

"I could work on that," says Rory.  He clears his throat.  "But I want you to realize I'm not—I don't want all the things everyone else wants, I just want to be with you.  And not have to worry about making plans and all that."  Erol looks suddenly very tired.  He puts down the plate he's been scrubbing.  Then, feeling as if the invisible hand of God Himself is pushing him, Rory goes over to Erol and puts an arm around his waist.  

 

"I can't do this anymore tonight," says Erol, and Rory isn't sure whether he means the conversation or the dishes.  One thing is clear though: he doesn't mean the relationship.  He leans into Rory's side and Rory tightens the grip of his arm.

 

"Let's go back to yours," Rory agrees.

 

When they get back to Erol's place, somehow Erol understands that Rory couldn't make himself have sex tonight.  Instead, they just lie in Erol's bed, staring at the ceiling until Erol puts an arm around Rory, and they sleep.

 

\---

 

"Mum," Archie complains, dumping his backpack on the floor of the kitchen, "What is that smell?  It's disgusting!  Why don't you light a candle or something?"  

 

"It's a shepherd's pie," Mrs. Phillips says, and Rory laughs from where he's reading a book on football plays on the floor.  

 

"No it isn't," says Archie, "It's nuclear waste."  

 

"Really now, sometimes I miss the day when you could take a switch to your children," says Mrs. Phillips, hands on her hips, making Rory laugh harder.  "It's vegetarian shepherd's pie, and it's also your dinner tonight."

 

"Boo," says Archie.  "We aren't going vegetarian, are we?  My mate's family are all vegetarians, all they  ever eat is beans and tomato soup and it's like actual torture, like in the Holocaust or something."

 

"No," says Mrs. Phillips, "We're not going vegetarian, but Rory's having his friend over tonight who doesn't eat meat, and I think we could all stand to open our minds a little."

 

"Oh."  Archie seems to lose interest, and drags himself, backpack and all, up the stairs.  Rory, on the other hand, is pleasantly surprised.  He didn't realize that was why his mother was cooking a special meal.  Mothers aren't supposed to pay attention to that sort of thing.  It makes him beam with pride a little.  Which in turn makes him embarrassed.  He makes himself be very interested in the footy book, with occasional glances at the clock.  Each minute is ages long.  Dinner time can't come soon enough.

 

\---

 

"Hello," says Erol, his face breaking out into a relieved smile when he sees that Rory is the one to answer the door.  Rory returns the smile, and thinks maybe someday he'll be able to greet Erol at the door with a kiss, like when Jamie has his girlfriend Amelia over for dinner.  Rory realizes he wouldn't even know if Amelia was vegetarian.  Maybe he should pay more attention.

 

"Everyone, this is Erol," says Rory to his family.  His dad couldn't make it home in time, but Jamie and Archie are at the table, looking extremely pleased that their guest has finally arrived so that they might eat.  "Erol, Jamie and Archie, and my mum, you know my mum," Rory says quickly.  Erol looks a little overwhelmed and joins everyone at the table.

 

"Hello Erol," says Archie, "My mate's called Errol, he's real good in goal," and then he looks up expectantly to his mother.  "Can we eat now?"

 

"You'll have to forgive him," says Jamie, "He's extremely obnoxious."

 

"Mum!" says Archie, and his mother just smiles and laughs.

 

Erol grins and takes the plate Mrs. Phillips passes him, and is about to start eating when Rory nudges him in the rib cage, feeling himself blush. 

"My mum always has us say a prayer," he whispers to Erol.  "You don't have to say it but don't start eating."

 

"Fair enough."  Erol nods and bows his head while Rory recites the Lord's Prayer as per usual.  He vaguely recalls that Erol's parents aren't at all religious, that they both come from Muslim families but for some reason they aren't Muslim themselves.  Most of the time Rory doesn't think about the Lord's Prayer.  It's just a thing that they do before eating, another ritual like brushing your teeth before you go to bed or combing your hair before going to school.  The Phillipses aren't even really very Catholic; they hardly ever go to mass except on holidays and Rory thinks of the Pope as this old fat man in a tower somewhere who no one really pays attention to.

 

Mercifully, it's just like any other dinner at Rory's.  Everyone is so wrapped up in whatever they're doing that it's like five people having five separate conversations.  The vegetarian shepherd's pie tastes much better than it smelled cooking, and the Yorkshire puds are fantastic.  At one point Amelia rings and Jamie spends the next thirty minutes on the phone with her.  Archie wanders off to the television.  Erol asks for seconds, and thirds.  The dog begs for scraps at the table and Erol confesses to Mrs. Phillips that he doesn't know what to do with dogs and he's really a cat person.  Rory's dad comes home, waves, and heads upstairs.  

 

"So yes," Rory says to Erol as they go up the stairs.  "That's my family."  

 

"I'm glad I finally got to meet them," says Erol.  Brilliant, thinks Rory, I've guessed utterly wrong again.  "I was a bit worried it was going to be formal or something, though, and that I'd have to remember which fork to use for each course."  

 

Rory laughs out loud.  "Not here you won't, I can't even remember the time everyone was at the table for dinner at once."

 

"Yeah, haven't you got three brothers?"

 

"Well, Bill's moved out, but--"

 

"Rory."  Erol has just walked into Rory's bedroom, which incidentally he shared with Bill up until Bill went to uni.  "You are in so much denial you're drowning in it."

 

"How's that?"  Rory follows Erol in, shutting the door behind him, and flops over onto his bed.  

 

"Your room, is _full_ of men."  Erol gestures around at Rory's various football posters.  There are lots of action poses.  It was the epitome of cool when Rory was about thirteen, and at this point the posters just seem like home to him.  "Attractive, sweaty men."

 

"Erol!  Now that's not being fair.  They're not like, Playgirl models or something, they're just footballers."  Besides, even if Rory is into men, he's not into that sort of men.  He prefers, well, he prefers Erol.  And...er...Graham Coxon.  He is now imagining Graham Coxon playing football.  It is an amusing picture.

 

"I dunno, I think it's a bit suspect," says Erol.

 

"You just want the whole world to buy into your vast gay conspiracy.  Because that way you would have men queueing up for you."  

 

"All right, fair enough, but it worked for you didn't it?"

 

"You're a wanker," says Rory, and kisses Erol because it seems like the right thing to do.

 

\---

 

Mae's boyfriend is called Gerald, specifically Big Gerald because there's already a Gerald in Mae's circle of friends and he is half Big Gerald's height.  He isn't much of a looker as far as Rory can tell, but he's a bit Goth like Mae is and he leads her onto the dance floor with a hand at the crook of her arm, like a true gentleman.  He has a white streak in his hair that makes him look a bit 'Bride of Frankenstein', and he has a vest covered in badges that he wears to clubs.

 

"But," Mae says disappointedly, "He won't let me do any more makeup on him than eyeliner."   The two of them are sitting in Rory's living room, halfheartedly watching television.  The house is unusually empty and Rory likes the background noise.

 

"Why would he?  Makeup looks crap on men," says Rory.

 

"It does not, it looks sexy!"  She grins.  "You should put some on Erol sometime, see what you think then."  Then her forehead wrinkles with concern.  "By the way, where was Erol the other night?  I had just given him some records to play and then he didn't show.  I want a word."

 

"Oh, he and I went off to see a show, sorry," Rory explains.  

 

"How are you two doing, by the way?" she asks, smiling sweetly.  "Any progress on whether or not you're seeing each other?"  At that, Rory laughs out loud.

 

"Oh, yes, we are.  But..."  He sighs.  "It's a bit weird.  Like, he wants it to be this really conventional relationship sort of thing, and I just want to be basically friends but, you know, have other things."

 

"You know," she says, "Maybe he just wants attention from you.  Maybe he just wants to know he's really important.  And he figures if he bothers with all that conventional stuff, you'll figure it out."

 

"I guess I don't know if I'm any good at that."

 

"Well, how about this—what has he done for you lately?"

 

"He came to dinner.  He didn't really want to but I think it was all right in the end, and my mum likes him."

 

"Well, you should go to dinner at his parents' then.  I bet they're nice.  I mean, they produced him after all."

 

"I know them actually, they terrify me."  Rory is sort of glad that it's been so long since he was last at Erol's parents' flat.  

 

"Oh."  Mae frowns.  "But it would be a nice thing to do."

 

"I'll try it," he says.

 

"Oh, and can I have his number so I can bother him about those records?"  

 

\---

\---

 

Erol picks up pasta and mozzarella and tomato sauce at the Italian grocery, where Paola is the cashier again and grins the moment she sees him.

 

"Erol, Maria has finally kicked out her idiot boyfriend," she says cheerily.  "Do you remember about Nick?"

 

"Yeah, he was the one who blew up at her for not wearing the dress he bought her to your mum's place in New York, I remember." He's not really sure _why_ he remembers these things, but if it makes Paola's day brighter, then why not?

 

"That's right!  Well, he's history.  Sooooo," she says, leaning in, "I keep telling her she ought to meet you.  I really think you'd love her."  

 

"D'you know, you say this to me every time--"

 

"And you always find an excuse."  Paola smiles.  "It's all right.  She's quite shy too."

 

"I have a boyfriend," says Erol, and Paola is about to come up with a reply to this, but she clearly can't think of one.  

 

"Have a nice day," she says instead, and hands him his change.

 

\---

 

For Erol, going to his parents' has a couple of objectives.  For one thing, there's the obvious—he knows he has to do it eventually, and he knows it will make Rory happy.  And then there's the fact that he wants to be in that environment, spending time with a married couple, reminding himself that couples don't always have to agree about everything to still love one another.  He's certain that his parents do.  Maybe twenty years along the line you become more like best friends than anything else, but there is a certain affection there that Erol has always known.  And he's thankful for that.

 

It's also a little bit nostalgic, even though it hasn't been very long since he lived there.  He wouldn't give up living on his own for anything, but at times he does miss being able to walk into a house that's really been lived in (his own flat looks squatted in), to smell the smells he associates with childhood, to sit at the table where he used to sit and watch as every few months his feet would get a little closer to the floor and then his knees began to press into the underside of the tabletop.  

 

"Merhaba," he calls at the door.  He also likes the feeling of speaking in Turkish, remembering dimly the way he used to see the entire world, where every object had only one name and English was only a confusing collection of familiar symbols smashed awkwardly together.  "It's Erol!"

 

"Hello," his father calls back, walking over to the doorway so that he can clap Erol on the back.  "My son returns home."  He laughs and invites Erol in.  Erol's mother is watching television with her hair in chopsticks, and she smiles to see Erol arriving.  

 

"I've brought dinner," he says, holding up his bag of groceries.  

 

"Wonderful," says his mother, "I was just going to order in tonight, you've come in to rescue us.  Erol, come here, explain this to me."  It's like he never left.  His mother is watching a soap and wants him to illuminate a bit of British pop culture that has escaped her.  His father pores over the classified ads in the newspaper while Erol lights the stove, making approving sounds and occasionally circling something in thick black pencil.  

 

When Erol starts to heat the sauce, his mother pushes him aside and puts in spices, claiming that Erol couldn't possibly have been about to put the same ones in.  He doesn't complain.  

 

They're all sitting down, chatting idly, when Erol's mother says, "Erol, I wish I believed that you would just come round to make us dinner, but you must have some news for us.  Just tell us what it is, will you?"

 

He laughs.  "It's not really that—oh, all right, it is that."

 

"So?" she says.

 

"Well, I...I wanted you to know that I've got a boyfriend."  Every word seems to come out of his mouth in slow motion.  He reaches for his fork, trying to pretend that he hasn't said anything important.  

 

"Erol?" says his father.  "Don't say this kind of shit."  Erol nearly jumps out of his seat.  Annoyance he expected.  But disbelief?

"I'm not lying to you," Erol says tentatively.

 

"So what do you want me to do about it, smile and say, oh, that's nice?" he says.  "Please excuse yourself from my table."

 

"Yes, sir," Erol mumbles and gets up.  His mother is lifting up her plate of food.  She goes over to the bin and scrapes all the pasta into it.  

 

"You think," she says, her voice level, "That because you have moved out you are free to disrespect us in this way?  To disrespect tradition?"

 

"But—"

 

"I want him to leave," says Erol's father, and Erol's mother holds up a finger.  One minute.

 

"I thought you were telling Aunty that you were all right with me," Erol says, realizing his hands are shaking.  He can't even think properly, can't string together any words that aren't right from the top of his head. 

 

"With you dressing the way you do!" his mother says, exasperated.  "Listening to your music!  Sneaking off to your bloody dance clubs!  Heaven knows my parents said the same thing about me!  But if you think I'm going to excuse you going off to be—a degenerate!  A _sodomite_ \--"

 

"Mother," Erol says, anger rising up in him faster than he can control, "What did your parents say when you told them you weren't going to be Muslim?"

 

"LEAVE!" she says, and slams the plate down so hard on the table that it shatters.  "GET OUT!"

 

So he does.  

 

Feeling very much like he's going to be sick, Erol walks up Holloway Road.  Actually, he is going to be sick.  He finds some convenient bushes.  

 

He hasn't just been disowned, he tells himself.  His parents are just shocked.  It's a sudden reaction.  They'll get over it.

 

But what if he has?  What if he can't ever go back here?  He should just be thankful his parents didn't resort to violence.  Can he still call them his parents?  Will they still call him their son?  And what the hell is wrong with having a gay son anyway?  He cooks them dinner!  He comes back and visits!  He's polite!  And now—this shit is what he gets.  He doesn't even deserve parents like this.  He needs--

 

He needs a train to Richmond.

 

By the bus shelter he is sick again, and the realization that the last thing he ate was cooked for his mother and father makes him vomit until he dry heaves.  His throat burning, he returns to the bus shelter and watches everyone make subtle movements to avoid him.  And who wouldn't avoid him, in this state?  He looks like the degenerate his mother was accusing him of being.  A skinny gay Turkish kid who just emptied his stomach behind a bus shelter.  How classy. 

 

The bus pulls up and he boards, willing himself just not to think about it.  Not to even think.

 

\---

 

"Is Rory there?" Erol asks Mrs. Phillips, who has greeted him in the doorway.  He tries to look over her shoulder to see if Rory is behind her.

 

"I'm sorry Erol, he isn't," she says, "He's out practicing driving the car with his father."  

 

"Oh," says Erol, because that's exactly the kind of day he's been having, isn't it?  He starts to turn around to leave.

 

"He'll be back soon, I think," Mrs. Phillips says.  "Do you want to come in for a cup of tea while you're waiting?"  

 

"Sure," says Erol.  He walks back in.  

 

"Do you have a preference?" Mrs. Phillips asks him.  "I have green tea, some Earl Grey--"

 

"Green is fine," says Erol.  He sits down at the table where he ate dinner a few nights ago, and Mrs. Phillips puts the kettle on.  Suddenly a wave of emotion hits him and he buries his head in his arms, willing himself not to cry.  He feels very much like he is about to.  When he was younger, he used to come home to his mother making çay on the gas stove.  He feels his eyes fill with water, and he inhales deeply.  It's no use.  Soon he is crying, in front of Rory's mum like a complete idiot no less.  

 

"What's happened, Erol?" Mrs. Phillips asks, putting a hand on Erol's shoulder.

 

"I dunno," Erol says into his arm.  "I got kicked out my parents' house."  He looks up, realizing that it's probably not going to embarrass her that much to see a young man cry if she's raised four boys.  She sighs.  

 

"I've been there," she says, and pats his shoulder.  "How old are you?  Eighteen?  Nineteen?"

 

"Yeah, I'm nearly twenty," says Erol.

 

"Right," she says.  She stands up and goes over to the other side of the table to sit down.  "I remember being twenty.  I think that was when I had a huge fight with my mum and dad."  Erol wonders why she hasn't asked him the obvious question.  "You're probably much smarter than I was when I was twenty.  I did some things I shouldn't have done.  I quit uni to live with my boyfriend, who was thirty, and let me tell you, mum and dad were not too pleased."

 

"Is he your husband now?"  She gasps.

 

"Oh, heavens, no!  He wasn't even that great back then, but he was good looking and like I've said, I was much, much stupider than you are when I was twenty."

 

"You've said I'm smarter than you were,"  Erol says, feeling himself actually smile, just a little bit.

 

"Well I was stupid.  Oh, there's the tea!"  Mrs. Phillips hops up from her seat to fetch the teapot and pours tea for both of them.  "Are you hungry, Erol?" she asks. 

 

"A bit."

 

"You shouldn't drink on an empty stomach, all right?"  She gets him some biscuits from a jar and puts them on a plate next to his teacup.

 

"You are much too nice to be real," Erol says.

 

"I'm not always nice to my own boys, in fact, let me give you an example—Archie!"  She turns to the stairwell.  "Shoo, shoo, go back upstairs, I'm having a private conversation!"  

 

"Does that mean you're having an affair?" Erol hears Archie ask.

 

"You wish I were that exciting!  And don't you talk to your mother that way.  Now, upstairs!  Go!"  Archie's pattering feet echo up the stairs.  "Anyhow, Erol, no, it was not a healthy relationship.  He was telling me all these things that he thought I ought to do and be.  And then I got pregnant and he left."

 

"Oh God, what a shithead," Erol says, shaking his head.  It occurs to him that he should probably feel embarrassed about swearing in front of his boyfriend's mother, but Mrs. Phillips hardly even seems to notice.

 

"He wanted me to have an abortion but I said no.  I'm still Catholic deep down, Erol, even when I see the Church doing things I couldn't possibly agree with.  And I didn't want my boys to get the kind of treatment some people got in school for being Catholic."  She sighs and sips her tea.  "But anyhow, I went through and had the baby, with mum and dad taking care of me all the way through.  As soon as Trevor left me they came back to my aid.  You have to understand, and I'm saying this as a mother, that your mum and dad won't leave you when they know you need them the most."

 

"And was that Rory's oldest brother?"

 

"No, that was Rory's half sister.  She's been adopted by a family in Bristol, and they've called her Kate.  I write her from time to time.  She has a husband and a baby of her own, now."  

 

"Oh."  Erol takes a long sip of tea.  As heat burns down into his stomach, he begins to feel a little bit less ill.  

 

"Erol, tell me about your parents, are they very traditional?"

 

"I guess."  He sighs.  "Not as much as they could be.  I think the reason Mum finally threw me out was because I compared this to her giving up Islam.  Both my parents wanted to go join the revolution—you know, when Cyprus became independent—but they hated the violence.  That's why they came to England, they thought it would be a safer place to raise a kid."  With a start, Erol realizes that she still hasn't asked him what 'this' is.  "I just don't think they know what to do.  Where they come from it would have been so out of place to have a gay son.  It's probably upsetting to them because of how I would have been treated back in Cyprus.  I don't think they know England is different."

 

"Erol," says Mrs. Phillips, "There's still a lot of hate here, even in London, even in the West End where all your nightclubs are.  People have to hide it, but it's still there.  If your mum and dad think of being gay as something that people choose to do, which they may well do, then they think you're making a choice that will give you a very unhappy life."

 

"It isn't, though, and you should know that as well as anyone—we don't choose who we fall in love with."

 

"I do know, Erol, and listen."  She looks him straight in the eyes.  "I'm glad you and Rory found each other."

 

Erol feels as if he's about to tear up again.  He swallows hard to stop himself.

 

"Thank you--" he starts, interrupted by the door opening.

 

"Mum," he hears Rory say, "I hate driving.  I am never going to drive a car again in my—Erol?"  Rory steps closer, puts a shaking hand on Erol's shoulder.  He rubs his hand in a circle.  "Are you all right?"

 

"No," Erol says.  "But I'm better."

 

\---

 

On Rory's bed, beneath the footballers, they talk quietly.  At first Erol lies down on the pillows and Rory sits up and strokes his back, but then Rory very slowly joins him and puts his arms around Erol's waist.  Their talking fades to silence.

 

"This is weird, for me," says Rory.

 

"What is?"

 

"I don't usually like touching people."

 

To a certain extent that makes sense to Erol.  When he was very young he didn't make friends easily because he couldn't speak English well and because he was the son of immigrants.  At that time, people touching him seemed inappropriate and unwanted.  Now, though, he seeks it.

 

"You don't have to hold me," says Erol, "If you don't want to.  But I just want to hold your hand.  Just like kids.  I just like to know..."  He tries to think of how to end the sentence.

 

"I know," says Rory.  "And right now it's holding you I want."  He tightens his arms around Erol's waist.

 

"Rory," Erol says.  "I don't want to change you."

 

"Why do you want to talk about this?"

 

"It takes my mind off of what's going on.  I don't want to think about that.  But I want to talk to you.  I want to know the answers.  Or at least work on them."

 

"Okay."  Rory shifts, one of his hands finding one of Erol's and curling around his fingers.  "Sometimes it does feel like you want to change me."

 

"Well I don't," says Erol, with a bit of a sigh because this is what he was afraid of.  "I just don't know what I'm doing.  And I try to find the best way to do things, and to show you—to show you a few things I want to do—and if you don't want to that's all right, but I wish I could show you new things and new places sometimes."

 

"That's all right," says Rory.  "It's just accepting what this is that's hard for me."  Now Erol wishes he were the one with his arms around Rory.  

 

"And I just don't want to seem like I'm trying to force you into anything."

 

"It doesn't seem like that," says Rory.  "I'm just really stupid, and crap at this relationship thing.  Never had a real one before.  Just some girls I messed around with.  Nothing like this."

 

"That makes two of us," says Erol.

 

"I want this to work," Rory says.

 

"It will work."

 

"I really—oh, fuck it."  Rory gets up from the bed and stands on the floor, staring at the door.  "I love you," he says.

 

"Can you look at me when you say that?" Erol asks, and suddenly he knows how important the answer is.

 

"I'm scared to," Rory says.  Then he turns around.  "I love you," he says again, quickly, like he's trying to get it over with.  And then he inhales and exhales and says, "I love you, Erol."

 

"I love you," Erol says back, looking into Rory's wide open eyes.

 

"Good," says Rory.  "Good."

 

\---

 

The next morning, Erol wakes up too early, when the light is wrong, and can't get back to sleep.  While he's lying exhausted in bed with the little white kitten—which he has decided to call Cassius, because the kitten is a bit small and stupid and not like Muhammad Ali at all—the phone rings.  

 

"Rory?" he asks.

 

"It's not Rory," says a familiar voice in Turkish, "It's your mother."

 

Erol hangs up the phone.

 

He lies around another half hour, and the phone rings a second time.  This time he only answers, "Erol here," but it's his mother again, just as he suspected.

 

"Erol," she says, her voice not betraying any anger at being hung up on, "My sister has died."  Erol feels his head swimming.  There is a surreality to the phrase.  It's like someone's just told him 'your car is on fire' or 'your dog just turned up at my house'.  An innate wrongness.  His mother does not have a sister, just like Erol has never had a car, or a dog.  It's always just been the three of them.  Faruk, Fatma, and Erol.  

 

"Mum," says Erol, and then coughs to cover it up, because he's still not sure whether he's been disowned, "I mean, er, what does that have to do with—I mean—"

 

"You will go to Cyprus with us," she says.  "We are leaving in three days.  We will spend two weeks at my father's home.  You will pay your respects."  No, Erol wants to protest.  You don't have a father.  It's just us.  It's always been just us.  This isn't fair.  "Erol?" she calls, as if she fears he's put down the phone and walked away.

 

"Why?" Erol says finally.  "Why do you want me to be there?  When I'm just an embarrassment?"

 

"You're family," she says firmly.  "Your father may say a lot of things but you are his only child, his only son."

 

"You know I can't not be who I am," he says.

 

"Thursday morning," says Fatma.  "We leave from Heathrow at eleven.  You will meet us at our home at seven-thirty." 

 

\---

\---

 

"But now she wants me to come to Cyprus with them.  So there I'll be, trapped in a big metal bird-shaped box, flying off to who knows where to deal with some sort of family emergency with a family I wouldn't even think of as my own, with the two people who pass for my family, and them going on thinking I'm making, you know, The Wrong Personal Choices," and he says it in a way that makes Rory see big blinking capital letters, "Then we're going to be living _in_ these people's house, and Rory, I know it's really crap of me to say this, but I don't know what makes this old Turkish bloke I've never even met _family_."

 

"Erol I wish I could..." but Rory hardly knows what he wishes he could do, other than figure out the right thing to say.  

 

"I wish I could just live with you instead," Erol says, the words spoken so forcefully into the phone that they hurt Rory's ear.  

 

"You don't want to know where you come from?" Rory says cautiously.  "Doesn't that interest you a little?"

 

"It does," says Erol, "But it scares me too.  Because I'm afraid everyone there is going to be completely alien to me too.  I'm afraid I'll still feel like an outcast."

 

"Well," says Rory.  "I don't think that everyone is going to be just like you."

 

"Thanks," says Erol, "I really appreciate that."

 

"But you are different from everyone else because you have two cultures, right?" Rory says.  "And to me, that's—I mean, I think it's a good thing, Erol."

"Rory, what I really wanted to ask you is—can I come over?"

 

\---

 

So Erol does, and he just sits on the bed with Rory's arms around him for a long time.  Then the shock finally wears off and Rory remembers that in four days Erol will be leaving the country for two weeks.   He kisses Erol full on the mouth and lays his hands on Erol's cheeks.  For a moment he worries that Erol won't want this right now, but instead Erol just grabs handfuls of Rory's hair and kisses back, leans into Rory and presses him back into the pillow.  Rory presses his face into Erol's shoulder and inhales, holds onto Erol like nothing could make him let go.

 

\---

 

Even though Erol can't be there, Rory is looking forward to today.  His little football club, put together mostly of neighborhood kids, is potentially on the brink of possibility.  The county government will fund one of the local clubs' attempt to participate in a youth league championship, to be determined by today's game.  Seeing as Rory will be eighteen next year, he's hoping this will be his chance to break into the wider world of sport before he can't play with a youth league anymore.  

 

Rory is, as usual, right forward: he's fast and gets aggressive when he plays, and he can focus in on trying to get the ball in the goal without letting the outside world distract him.  He's not the club's star player, that's Dave Adams, fellow forward, or arguably Jamie the Smaller who is in goal (Jamie the Greater is of course Rory's brother, a fantastic youth league player in his own time; Jamie the Smaller is actually much larger than he is however).  But he can hold his own, and he's saved the club from more than one loss in the last few minutes of a game.  

 

The pitch is shiny green from weeks of London rain, but today the sun is out and fairly hot.  It's almost summer, and it's as if the weather has finally noticed.  Rory does up his spikes nice and tight, high fives everyone, and goes out to play.

 

When Rory plays football, regardless of how serious the stakes may be, the game is always the most important thing.  Every time he was ill as a small child, he would spend hours reading up on the history of strategies and plays.  He keeps a close eye on all of the new maneuvers being tried out in the Euro Cup and the World Cup when there is one.  He plans things, he moves as part of the machine.  

 

The game is locked at 0-0, neither club willing to let its guard down, until finally Rory makes a pass to Evans that takes the goalkeeper completely by surprise; there are only ten minutes left in the game and both sides' defense only tightens.  Still, the opposing club scores.  Starting from a corner kick, Dave gets another one in, and the tension is high.  And then there are only two minutes, and then one, and then they're in overtime.  Dave is exhausted, Rory can see.  It's up to him.  The defense kicks him the ball, and he runs with it up the pitch, focusing on nothing else, keeping it close to his feet.

 

And he scores.

 

There is a great deal of noise and confusion, and then Rory feels himself being swept up into a massive embrace amongst everyone in his club, as well as Bill and Archie who made it to the game.  

 

"I think ice creams for all," says Bill, rubbing the top of Rory's head.  

 

Rory ducks out to freshen up, unable to erase the smile from his face.

 

\---

 

"That was a good shot."  The other club's goalkeeper is in the toilets, splashing water over his red face.  Rory dimly recalls he's called Williams.  He isn't stocky like Jamie the Smaller, instead he is tall and muscular and has the reflexes of a cat.  "Nicely played."

 

"Thanks," Rory says with a laugh, and goes over to a sink to do the same.  "You weren't bad yourself, we don't tie too many games."

 

"It's a shame," says Williams.

 

"What is?"

 

"Your club would have done well to have you in the youth cup."  Rory blinks, uncertain.

 

"What makes you think they won't?" he asks.  

 

"This," says Williams, and the next thing Rory knows he's being pressed against the floor, Williams' hand over his mouth.  Rory tries to shout but of course he can't be heard, and he realizes to his embarrassment that he's crying as he tries to pry the strong hand from his face.  Williams drags Rory across the floor, scraping the side of Rory's face against the tiles, and then he shoves a wad of toilet roll into Rory's mouth.  Then he's cornering Rory into a stall, batting away Rory's arms like Rory is a child, pushing Rory's legs around.  He climbs up on top of the toilet seat and jumps down onto Rory's legs.  There is a sickening crunching sound, and pain.  More pain than Rory has ever felt in his life.  Williams hops back up onto the toilet and does it again, and again.  Rory is screaming and finally coughs up the makeshift gag, screaming and screaming while Williams runs off and then the pain is too much and he blacks out.

 

\---

 

"Am I dead?" Rory asks.  It seems like a logical question for a moment, and then he realizes where he is.  He's in hospital, and his mother is holding his hand, crying.  

 

"Rory, oh Rory," she says through sobs.  "You're awake."

 

"I'm alive," says Rory.  He can hardly feel anything.  "Am I paralyzed?"

 

"No, they just shot you with every kind of painkillers they had," he hears Archie saying.  "It was quite cool actually.  In a really awful way."

 

"David Archibald," says Rory's mother in a warning tone.  It always means business when she says David Archibald.  

 

"Well," says Rory, suddenly feeling the gravity of the situation hit him.  His stomach lurches.  "I'm about to be sick."

 

\---

 

Rory gets out of hospital after one night.  Despite the feeling like Williams had crushed both of his legs into little bits, it turns out he has only a broken ankle and a collection of colorful bruises.  The only reason he fainted was because of the pain.  He also gets a great deal of sympathy from everyone in the club and from his family.  His mother takes a day off work to make sure that Rory is comfortable and that he is able to move around the house as best he can.  He'll go back to school in two days, and he'll use a wheelchair to get around.  Thankfully, the building has an elevator so he can get to classes on the upper level.  

 

He tries not to think too much about the fact that he'll probably never be able to play a proper game of footy again in his life.  That would make him sick all over again.  Instead, he occupies his time by writing Erol.  Erol gave him an address on Cyprus to write to, so he writes:

 

_Erol –_

 

_We won the big footy game.  Then the other club's goalkeeper broke my ankle.  Feeling a bit crap.  Hope you're well.  Write back._

 

_R x_

 

It seems like a rather selfish thing to write but he hardly has the energy to add anything else or inquire about Erol.  For a moment he starts to worry that something could have gone wrong with Erol's plane, and his heartbeat gets faster and his face feels hot, but then he figures, if He actually does exist, God wouldn't do that sort of thing to someone who prays before every meal, even if he is a sodomite who only goes to Mass for holidays.

 

\---

 

After Rory has spent a rather hellish day in school, he is surprised by Pete and Dave from the footy club, who delightedly spin his wheelchair around on the pavement until he feels a bit dizzy.  But he laughs, and grudgingly accepts hugs from his teammates.  

 

"I hear you've been talking to my cousin," says Pete, slapping Rory on the back of his wheelchair.  "She says you've got an impressive record collection."

 

"Erm?"  Rory is bewildered _._ HasPete got a cousin?  Has Rory been showing his record collection to girls?

 

"Impress her with anything else, did you?" Dave adds, and Pete punches him in the side.

 

"Oi, that's family!  I wouldn't go there!  Anyway, _as_ I was saying, we decided we'd take you down the record store and you can get some new vinyl on us."

  
"I should get my ankle broken more often," Rory muses.

 

"Only if you win us a match first!"  Still laughing, Dave and Pete push Rory's chair down the street all the way to the HMV.  While there, Rory discovers a few things.  First, Pete's cousin is a certain girl called Mae Fitzgerald, and whom both Dave and Pete think Rory has an eye on.  Considering how difficult to explain his current situation is, he won't disabuse them of that notion.  Second, wheelchair handles are perfect for hanging bags of records on, except for the part where they can cause a bit of topheaviness that nearly results in an accident.  Third, there is some hope for Rory in the world.

 

\---

 

It comes in the form of a phone call.  Well, actually, Rory has spent the entire weekend playing records in his bedroom.  He's had two turntables for a while now, both of them a bit crap but he's sort of permanently borrowed a mixer off Erol so he can at least adjust levels and add filters.  He understands now why the love of music has led to DJing for Erol.  Once you spend enough time listening to music, you can't help thinking about how perfectly one song would lead into another, how much alike some particular riff or lyric is to a different song.  After being yelled at for bursting in at the wrong moment one too many times, Rory's dad tapes an "ON AIR" sign onto Rory's door, and the room becomes unofficially known as 'the station' at family dinners.  

 

As such, when Rory's dad picks up the phone on that particular occasion, he shouts, "Someone's trying to phone into your show, can you put him on the air?"  Glaring, Rory stomps into the kitchen and picks up the receiver.

 

"Sorry, my dad is a bit mad, who is this?"

 

"This is Glen Campbell," Rory thinks he hears, and he is about to call someone out on being a wanker when he realizes it is probably actually _Glyn_ Campbell, Erol's mate from the club. 

 

"Oh, hello," says Rory, unsure of what's going on.

 

"I know this is horribly short notice, but do you think you could come do a set at the club on--"  

 

"Hold on," Rory says, as he hears the last strains of the Human League single he has on upstairs.  He races back to his room and takes off the needle.  His dad is holding out the phone, looking unamused.  "Sor-ry, had to take the needle off a record before--"

 

"I've been there," says Glyn, which Rory has decided he's excited about, because Glyn is much cooler than Rory is.  "So anyway, could you come in this Thursday?  I just realized I didn't have anyone to fill in Erol's place, so I've got the other DJ filling in for Erol but now I need someone to do an opening set.    I hear you play records," he says.

 

"Hold on."  Rory puts his hand over the receiver.  "Dad, he hears I play records.  Can I go do same in a nightclub Thursday?"

 

"Do you have a way to get home?" his dad asks.

 

"I'll make something happen," Rory says.  He tries not to betray his urge to grin ecstatically.  "Glyn," he says into the phone, "It's a go."  Glyn is laughing on the other end, having evidently heard the conversation.  But he thanks Rory profusely.  After he hangs up Rory feels the urge to hug someone, and, lacking Erol, he chases down the dog so he can put his arms around her and squeeze.

 

\---

 

Rory is a bit worried that for some reason, on principle, Erol is going to be upset with him.

 

He explains this to Mae.

 

"People really _liked_ what I was doing," he says.

 

"Soooo," Mae says, poking her finger into his cheek, "Why do you look so down?  It's like someone's just told you you were about to be executed!"

"It's Erol's thing," Rory says, his head down.  There is a piece of paper on the carpet, and he kicks at it.  "It only happened 'cause he wasn't there and 'cause Williams kicked my head in.  Or, my ankle, as it were."

 

"And you think Erol's going to be angry at you?"  

 

"It's his thing.  It's not mine."

 

Mae sighs.  "I think he'll be happy," she says.  "Wasn't he the one who taught you how to mix?"

 

"Mostly," says Rory, "I taught myself.  And now I don't think anymore about whether he would say I was doing a good job.  I just think about what I want to do, and I do it."

 

"I don't think you really properly love someone until you can do that," she says.  "Stop worrying all the time about whether you're doing something right."

 

"Is that how you feel about Gerald?"

 

Mae looks at Rory blankly, and then pulls her arms around her shoulders.

 

"Gerald asked me to marry him yesterday," she says quietly.

 

"What?  How old are you?"

 

"I'm nineteen," she says.  "That's how old my mum was when she married my dad.  My brother's twenty-two and he was married last year."  Actually, Rory realizes, his brother Bill is twenty-three and married, and then Jamie and Amelia are twenty and probably not far from marriage.  

 

"Are you happy?" Rory asks gently.

 

"I don't know," Mae admits.  "I mean, I love being with Gerald, but forever is...such a long time."

 

Rory puts his arm around Mae's shoulders.  Thankfully, Mae doesn't ask what the gesture means.  She just buries her face in his sleeve.  

 

\---

 

So Rory takes Mae out to one of the tiny little clubs that seemingly only Erol knows about; Gerald would never find them there.  Rory is on crutches by now, and it's easier for him to get around, to go out.  They pick up dinner at a café – not Mae's, a different one that Rory used to go to before shows – and stay out late dancing.  Rory even gets the chance to play a couple of records while the DJ ducks into the toilets, Mae sitting next to him and thumbing through sleeves.  It makes him miss Erol more than ever, but he smiles when she gets up and dances.  Mae has been living with Gerald, and she doesn't want to go back there tonight, so instead she goes home with Rory.  Rory's mum puts her up on the sofa even though it's three AM and they've woken her up.  Mae gives Rory a look that he doesn't understand before she goes to sleep.

 

\---

 

Rory gets a letter from Erol in the morning.  He saves the envelope because he's never seen Cyprian postage stamps before.  Erol seems not to have got Rory's letter when he wrote it; he doesn't mention a thing about Rory's letter.  Instead, he writes vaguely about family trouble and his strange step-grandmother, about the beautiful beaches and the scent of the air.  He tells Rory he's been taking Polaroids that he can't wait to show Rory, and that he misses him.  

 

Rory can read between the lines.  He knows something is worrying Erol beyond just Rory's health.  Family for Rory has always been simple.  His parents, his three brothers, his two sets of grandparents, his multitudes of cousins and his one surviving pair of great-grandparents.  Going to his aunt and uncle's for Christmas dinner, where he used to be teased for being the smallest in the family until he grew nearly a foot over the course of two years.  And he realizes that all Erol has—all Erol has ever had—is his mother and father, and now he's having to relearn what family means.

 

He wants to feel Erol in his arms again.

 

"How's Erol?" Mae asks, walking up to him.  She's been more cheerful since she awoke, saying she'll just have a long talk with Gerald about how she isn't ready for marriage yet.  In order to avoid suspicion, she'll tell him that she was at a girlfriend's overnight.  Gerald's never been that possessive, though, she says.

 

"I don't know," says Rory.  "Apparently his aunt died."

 

"It must be hard being so far away," she murmurs.

 

Rory doesn't say anything.  He just clutches the letter to his chest, and hopes the next five days will be over as fast as possible.

 

\---

\---

 

Erol has been extremely ill over the course of the whole flight, and the first thing they do at arriving in Nicosia (Lefkoşa to him; he's thinking completely in Turkish now, overwhelmed by the sheer amount of writing that surrounds him in the first language he ever understood) is buy mouthwash and a toothbrush so that he can look fresh when he meets his grandfather.  

 

He goes into the toilets, looks at himself in the mirror.  He does look, just, different from his parents.  He tried to be as inconspicuous as possible, substituting his usual tight T-shirt for a black one that's a little larger; he got it for free from a radio station contest.  It strikes him that Rory once wore this shirt home, and he feels himself blush, even if his face doesn't really change color in the mirror.  He splashes his face with cold water and dries it with a paper towel.  The one thing is his long hair, his overgrown girl's bob that he usually so prides himself on.  That's going to stand out any way you slice it.  Maybe he'll pull it back.  

 

His parents have barely spoken a word the entire day, Erol is thinking as he brushes his teeth.  His father has been clearly giving Erol the silent treatment, which is his usual reaction in an argument.  His mother has been different—a stunned silence, like there aren't any words left in her, except for the occasional bit of thickly accented English to airport staff.  It's a bit frightening, but then, Erol doesn't have a lot of words of his own.  All he can think about is how much he misses Rory already.  How many minutes he wasted doing anything else when he could have been holding Rory.  Two weeks seems impossibly long with only words on paper to bridge the gap between them.  He's already imagining how he'll describe this part of his trip.  Seems like he'll need a lot of paper.

 

\---

 

Erol's grandfather's house is apparently closer to the edge of the city than the center, so they call a cab.  Erol gets shoved into the front seat, probably so his parents don't have to look at him, and bizarrely their cab driver is smoking, rolling down the window so he can tap ash from the end of his cigarette.

 

"Where are you from?" he asks Erol, who hasn't said a word and doesn't think he's giving off any vibes other than 'please leave me alone until the end of eternity unless your name is Rory Phillips'.  

 

"England," Erol mutters under his breath.  "London."  Sometimes in London people ask him where he's from, looking at his unusual features, and he tells them his parents are from Cyprus.  Ha ha.

 

"But your Turkish is fine."

 

"My parents are from here."

 

"And they make you do all the talking?"  He laughs.  

 

"Sure."  Erol stares out the window.  "Something like that."  

 

The stucco houses roll by, and Erol can smell the ocean on the breeze.  It's so bizarrely un-London-like.  Where are the buses, the people handing out newspapers, the chip stands?  It's irrational, but he expects the town to unfold revealing the real capital city hidden somewhere in the center.  

 

Somehow by the time the cab is parking, he has begun to find it all beautiful.

 

\---

 

When Erol's father knocks on the door, it is opened by an old man who does actually look a great deal like Erol's mother.  The eyebrows, the chin, the intense expression—these are all things Erol has grown up with, but transposed onto another face in such a way as to make them pop out, suddenly noticeable in the new context.  

 

" _Merhaba_ ," he says, gruff and emotionless.  Erol recognizes that tone of voice.  It means, I'm tired of greeting people at the door day in and day out.  I want to be left alone.  But then he sees Erol's mother, and he holds out his arms to her.  Sternly, she extends a hand to shake his, and then both crumple into each other's arms. 

 

Erol glances at his father, arranging his face into a look that conveys his sudden feeling of awkwardness.  But then he realizes his father is crying too.  Fucking hell.  Is he supposed to be feeling emotional over this?  

 

After a long silence, only broken by the occasional inhalation of Erol's mother, Erol's grandfather speaks.

 

"You must come inside," he says.  He wipes his eyes.  "You're Erol?" he says, turning to Erol as he walks in.  Erol nods, still feeling a little apprehensive.  His grandfather turns to his father.  "Does he speak Turkish?  Does he understand what I'm saying?"

 

"Yes, I understand," says Erol patiently.  "I'm sorry.  This is very--"

 

"Of course," says Erol's grandfather.  

 

The house is dark and cramped, and smells like an odd combination of both of Erol's homes: the Turkish tea and spices of his parents' place, and the overdue-for-a-cleaning musk of his own.  The walls are painted yellow, or maybe they were white once, and there's an overall feeling of warmth to the place.  A scraggly longhaired cat rubs against Erol's ankles and he suddenly misses Cassius, left with a friend to hopefully not a horrible fate.  

 

"Maria?" calls Erol's grandfather.  

 

An old woman appears from another of the house's cavelike rooms.  She is wearing all black, and a shawl that covers her head and shoulders.  It's not a hijab, just a shawl like old grandmothers wear.  She looks nothing like Erol's mother; obviously most of her genes came from her father.  

 

"Maria," says Erol's mother, as if she's confused.  

 

"She is my wife," Erol's grandfather says.  Ah, a step-grandmother.  That makes sense, he guesses.

 

"Hello," she says in accented Turkish.  "You are Fatma, and Faruk, and Erol."  Erol can't quite place the accent, but if he makes an educated guess he figures she's probably Greek, and from the other side of the island.

 

He doesn't know what it's like.  He can't.  His parents have talked about it, but he doesn't know.  He understands that it's the reason for the unbearable, stinging silence that has filled the room.  Three generations of us, he thinks, finding ourselves doing things that no one can understand, that are against tradition, because we trip and stumble and fall into love.

 

Erol must look as exhausted as he feels, because Maria takes this as her cue to lead Erol to the room where he'll be sleeping.  

 

"It belonged to Nesrin," she says apologetically.  

 

"My aunt," Erol says, looking in at the small bed and the little lamp beside it.  "I never met her, so I guess that's the closest I can get."

 

"Little philosopher," Maria says, a small smile touching her lips.  "You are more like Hakan than you know."

 

\---

 

Nesrin's old room is a very simple room, with just the bed, a table with a lamp, and a chest of drawers which turns out to be full of old, strong-smelling women's clothes.  It's so small that Erol needs to duck to go in the doorway.

 

Erol stays there all day.  He still feels a bit ill, but more importantly, he doesn't want to have to face his parents.  He's sure that as soon as everyone stops being uncomfortable about Maria's presence, they'll turn to him and Hakan will start talking about how Erol needs to cut his hair and buy new shirts that aren't too small.  Hakan doesn't know Erol.  Why would he think of Erol as anything but a black sheep and a nuisance, a problem that needs to be fixed?  

 

His mother brings him rice for dinner, her eyes dark.  

 

"We'll go to the market tomorrow and get you more things to eat.  They're not used to vegetarians in the house."

 

"Why did you bring me here?" Erol says.  "I'm just making everything worse."

 

"You're my son," she says, and leaves him the plate of rice on the bedside table.  "Get some sleep, Erol.  You really don't look well."

 

He eats, and changes his clothes, and lays down on the bed, starting to compose another letter to Rory in his mind.  Rory would like it here.  Rory has such a strong connection to his family.  Rory can't speak Turkish, but he cuts his hair and eats meat, and...most of all, he likes (once he gets beyond his initial shyness) new places and new people.  Erol hates all the change in his life.  He just wants to be with Rory, and to DJ at Going Underground every Thursday night, and to stay comfortably in London forever, and never grow old.  

 

He pulls the covers over his head and tries to sleep.

 

\---

 

The next two days remind Erol very much of the way London looked out of his fourteen-year-old eyes.  During the days he sleeps; at night he wanders the streets of Nicosia aimlessly, shoulders slumped, glaring out from underneath his fringe.  No one speaks to him and he speaks to no one.  He likes it that way.  In the house everyone is silent too, except for quiet conversations held out of Erol's earshot.  His mother has stopped bringing him meals, realizing that he isn't ill, and instead he forages in the kitchen for vegetables he can fry with rice in olive oil.

 

After those two nights, on the fourth day, Erol creates a draft of his letter to Rory.  Everything in his head has boiled down to seven words: _THERE ARE NO GAY NIGHTCLUBS IN NICOSIA_.

 

\---

 

"Erol?"

 

He stuffs the letter into his pocket and wanders over to open the door.  Maria is standing there with a bag.

 

"I wanted to talk with you a moment," she says.

 

"Listen," Erol says.  "I know I'm not being very social, but you don't have to worry about me.  I think my parents only took me here because they're upset with me over—something.  I'll just mind my own business, I know I'm not helping anything."  Maria mutters something under her breath in what must be Greek.  

 

"You're stupid because you're young," she says, looking at him with her eyes gleaming.  

 

"Thanks," Erol says, although being sarcastic in Turkish doesn't have quite the same effect as it does in English.

 

"All young people think the world turns just for them," Maria goes on.  "Until we find someone to care for, we all do.  But did you think I came here to tell you how stupid you are?"

 

"Er, no," Erol says, shuffling his feet.  "I suppose I thought you were going to tell me to come out of my room and eat with the whole family."

 

"You are half right," she says.  "I want to ask you.  Your mother says you are a musician."

 

"I play a bit of guitar," Erol admits.  

 

"I play the piano," says Maria.  She grabs him by the arm and drags him out of Nesrin's room, ignoring his protests.  

 

"I can't play traditional style," Erol finally says once she's thrust a guitar into his arms.  As it turns out, the rest of the family is out for whatever reason.  The little house is bigger when it's empty.  Either that, or it's always been big, and Erol just didn't notice.  The sitting room is half sitting room and half music room; myriad instruments line the far wall.  The guitar Erol is holding is certainly the most expensive one he has ever touched.  Intricate patterns and designs line the body and cover the twelfth and fourteenth frets and the pick guard.

 

"Play me what they are listening to in London," she says.  Part of Erol is screaming, _why should you do what this woman says?_   But somewhere in him, another part of him silences the first and tells him that she's his step-grandmother and therefore he has to respect her.  He starts strumming the chords to the Manic Street Preachers' "Love's Sweet Exile".  Clearly he has gone insane.  However, Maria is now at the piano, finding the chords and playing along.  Erol can't help but double over in laughter.  An old Greek grandmother playing the Manics on an upright piano.  Wonders never cease.

 

"He laughs," Maria says, beginning to smile.  She stops playing.  "I know you don't want to be here.  But we must know each other.  No one talks to me very much, and no one talks to you very much.  So I just talk to you."

 

"Maybe I don't want people to talk to me," says Erol.  It feels a little more like a lie than it might have ten minutes ago.  "No—I don't want people to talk to me about things I'm supposed to be doing.  About how I'm doing everything wrong."

 

"What did you do wrong?" Maria asks.

 

"I'm not traditional enough for my parents," he says, which is probably the best way to put it.

 

"You are not traditional, but you have other things to give them," she says, thankfully not requesting further explanation.  "We can do this together."  Erol doesn't know how much he wants to be 'in it together' with Maria, but if she's going to try to change his parents and their prejudices too, then he can't help it.  "And listen!"  Maria grabs Erol by the chin; he squirms away, frowning.  "One of these nights you're going to go out into the city alone and not come back!  It is not safe to go alone.  I don't know if you are a homosexual or if you just look like one, but we are not like London here.  There is still hate everywhere."  

 

Maria then proceeds to grab Erol's arm and drag him into the kitchen.  Erol's not sure why she insists upon touching him so much.  But then, maybe other people's families are like this—and yes, he thinks, Rory's brothers always slap each other on the back, and his mother gives her sons hugs, and his father ruffles Archie's hair....  Erol misses Rory more now than ever.  He shakes his head to clear it, and Maria is rummaging through cabinets.  Apparently this has turned into an impromptu Greek cooking lesson.  What can Erol do?  Maria must have tried his stir fry.

 

"Wait—Maria, you know I don't eat meat?"

 

"Of course," says Maria, waving him off.  "Many Greek dishes have no meat.  You'll like it.  Get me a mixing bowl."

 

\---

 

The family enjoys the meal, and Erol has to admit—he's beginning to like the company.  The next few days, he emerges from his room and spends time in the house that was once his mother's home.  No one is talking about Nesrin or taking Erol to task for his haircut.  Instead, Hakan asks Erol about his music, and explains that he's been playing guitar since childhood.  Erol's father is more animate than Erol has ever seen him as he talks about current events, gesturing wildly and sometimes even standing up at the table to make his points.  Maria and Erol cook meals together, and they buy Turkish spices at the market so that Erol can teach Maria a bit about Turkish cooking.  He sometimes has to ask his mother for help, which she grudgingly offers, but unlike the rest of the family she is moody and keeps to herself.

 

One day they all go out for dinner in a seaside restaurant (they're serving almost solely fish, but Erol makes due with a large plate of hot chips), and Hakan lends Erol an Instamatic camera "to show your friends all about your holiday".  He takes snapshots of the beach at sunset, and when they're not looking, he also snaps his family: Maria laughing at a stray dog, Hakan talking to the cook among rows of fish, and Faruk with an arm tightly around Fatma's back, fingers curling at her waist.  

 

Before he goes to bed, Erol sits down and writes a letter to Rory.  He knows now exactly what to say.

 

\---

 

Erol's mother knocks on his door in the middle of the night.  He lets her in and sees tears on her face in the low light of the lamp.

 

"Erol," she says, "You do know that tomorrow is my sister's funeral."

 

"Yes, Mum.  I'll be there."  His mother goes and sits on the end of his bed, as if he were a small child who needed comforting.  Erol suspects he's not the one who needs comforting though.

 

"No one told you how Nesrin died."

 

"Actually, Grandfather did," Erol says.  "She was hit by a car when she was walking.  It's awful."

 

"It was not an accident," says Fatma.  Erol swallows.  Why would someone murder his aunt?  "It was not an accident," she says again.  "And it was not the first thing that happened.  Hakan told me the stories.  He went across the border for his work.  Then he met Maria.  He came back to see her and the police hit him.  I believe it was the same for Maria.  When he finally brought her to the Turkish side, they had to hide in someone's car, in the back.  They were married in secret, but people still found out, and painted rude things on the house.  The man who drove the car worked in the same office as Nesrin.  When he found out about her parents, he sent letters to the house.  They said, you have done wrong.  You are an insult to the Turkish people for accepting this woman into your home.  She was protected by police at work—those hypocrites, those same men who beat my father—but they could not stop this man from hitting Nesrin with his car.  He hit her and he backed up his car and hit her again, two more times.  He wanted her to be dead.  That is how my sister died."

 

"Mum, I--"  Erol sits up, puts his arm around his mother's shoulders.  

 

"Why do they do it?" she says.  "Why does my father still marry this woman, why does he keep her in this horrible place?  Why couldn't he have the sense to leave like me, to find somewhere that I would be safe from violence, to find somewhere that I will have done the right thing, claimed that he threw me out of the house because I had committed a wrong.  I did everything I could, Erol, everything, to keep my father a respectable man, and he goes and destroys it himself!  I come back to my home and find that he has given up Islam and married a Greek, Erol!  He's such an idiot, my father is such an idiot!"  Fatma hangs her head, inhales through her tears.  "He's just like you, Erol, too damn stubborn to understand that everything has a consequence."  Erol is a little stunned, but he has to defend himself.

 

"Sometimes people take chances because there's something worth the risk.  I know nothing is worth your sister's life, but no one could have known that."

 

"He's ruined himself.  Ruined.  And for what?"

 

"For the thing that makes him happy beyond all else.  The reason that he gets out of bed every day, even if he has lost everything else, even his own daughter.  The thing that makes him alive."

 

Fatma's tears stop, and she looks at Erol.  "You—you really are in love, aren't you."

 

"I must be."  Erol laughs nervously.  "The most precious thing is just to make Rory happy, and I'd do some really stupid things for that."

 

"Rory?  That boy you brought to the house so many times—you love him?"

 

"I can't believe I'm telling you this.  Yes.  I love him."  There is a long pause.

 

"Erol," Fatma says finally, "The world has shown me so many strange things that maybe I can understand why a man can love a man the way another man loves a woman.  Maybe I can understand why my father did so much to be with Maria.  But I will never understand why my baby sister had to die."

 

"I don't think anyone will ever really understand life and death."

 

"Or the terrible things people do."

 

"Or that.  But--"  Oh, bollocks, now Erol's getting a bit teary.  He chokes on his words.

 

"My son," says Fatma, and squeezes him tighter.

 

\---

 

When two weeks are up, Erol is so tired of living with his family that the feeling of being in his own flat with a boyfriend and a cat is worth the pain of leaving Nicosia.

 

But it does hurt.  He's fallen for the city.  There's nothing of London in Nicosia except the history, the feeling of a people building and building on its heritage, revering the modern with the same sort of everyday respect with which they revere the centuries-old.  He still takes walks alone, though in daylight now, in the late afternoon when everyone is resting.  It's just something he likes to do, he's decided.  From Hakan's doorstep to the fish markets to the air-conditioned jewelry shops in the modern part of town he rambles, edging through narrow streets and stumbling up steps, snapping hundreds of Polaroid pictures.  His hair has grown long enough to push behind his ears, and he wears Hakan's linen shirts with his own drainpipe jeans, a sort of mad amalgam of old and new, of East and West.

 

Yes, he'll miss Nicosia.

 

He won't miss the way he doesn't know where anything is in the house.  He won't miss the doorways he can't fit through.  He won't miss the way Maria takes two bloody hours to take a bath, and sometimes seems to just sit in the tub coughing up a lung, which makes Erol's insides squirm a little.  He certainly won't miss the way Hakan has begun making thinly veiled suggestions that Erol ought to give up on vegetarianism.  And he won't miss the things that made him want to leave home in the first place—his mother's persistence in doting on Erol and babying him, and his father's constant yelling the house down about the stupid bloody stock exchange.

 

But he'll miss sitting in a chair, Agha the cat on his lap, while Hakan plays a zither and Maria accompanies him, his mother reading a book while Faruk plays with the antennas on his little radio trying to tune into a broadcast: that sound of whirring and tweeting when Faruk's fingers turn the dial is just another sound in the music.

 

Except then Erol gets a letter from Rory, a letter that was evidently sent the day after Erol left, and at that point such a wave of anger and protective instinct hits him that he can hardly sit down on the plane all the way home.

 

\---

\---

 

It's funny.  If Rory looks back on that first meeting, at Pete's party—him bored, her drunk—he could never have imagined at the time that Mae Fitzpatrick would become attached at his hip.  Rory doesn't even mind Mae's company.  It's just odd, that's all, odd how ever since he's reinvented himself as a DJ, she hasn't let go of him.  They go to clubs, concerts, art shows....  It's odd, because Rory's got a boyfriend and Mae's got a boyfriend.  And Rory is still deeply in love with Erol.  What worries him, though, is that perhaps it hasn't anything to do with Rory's new hobby and much more to do with the fact that his boyfriend is currently in Cyprus.  So even though he rather likes Mae, Rory is a little bit relieved that she finally agrees to go home to her and Gerald's flat before Rory goes to pick Erol up at Heathrow.

 

It's a strange scene.  Rory spots Erol almost at once, even though Erol is darkly tanned and his hair is longer, wilder.  He looks gorgeous.  Erol's parents follow him, and Rory waves, wanting to run to Erol but unable, what with the crutches and all.  And then Erol's mother spies Rory's dad, who drove Rory out to the airport.  Erol runs up to Rory and his parents walk quickly after, Erol looking extremely confused.  

 

"How did you—"  Erol glances around him, as if he's surprised to see so many Londoners in one place, which he probably is.  "Oh, that's _weird_."

 

"Erol," says Rory, and he feels a bit of stinging in his eyes.  "Hi."

 

" _Merhaba_ —er—hello, Mr. Phillips," says Erol.  "Fuckin' English.  I mean, sorry.  Rory, I'm being awful.  Are you all right?"

 

"Better now," says Rory softly.

 

Fatma is talking quickly in Turkish to Faruk, who is growing louder by the second.  Finally Faruk shouts, but Fatma snaps back with something that shuts him up.  Erol laughs softly.

 

"He's just said, how does he know you're not my gay boyfriend.  And my mum said, who knows, but you've picked us up at the airport so that's no reason not to be polite."  

 

"Arthur Phillips," says Arthur, holding his hand out.  "Rory's driver."  Argh, did he really have to make an obnoxious joke?  Faruk probably won't even get it.

 

"Faruk Alkan," says Faruk, taking his hand and shaking it.  "I am Erol's father."  He gestures back.  "And my wife, Fatma."

 

"We have enjoyed having Rory to our house," she says with a strange smile.  Rory can't tell if it's faked.  

 

"Rory says you live down Islington way?" Arthur asks, holding out a hand to take Fatma's suitcase.  She eyes him suspiciously, but nods and hands him the bag anyway.  "All right, come on, I'm not sure I've parked my car legally."

 

"Oh, hell," says Erol to Rory in low tones.  He coughs.  "Your dad wants to _drive_ us to Soho?"

 

"Er, there's no problem with it, he's off work for the weekend," says Rory.  Erol almost looks upset, and Rory wants to put his arms around Erol, but he can't.

  
"God, I missed you," says Erol.  "I want to tell you everything."  He leans even closer and says even softer, so softly that Rory has to concentrate hard on what he's saying, "I can't wait to—can't wait to hold you.  I just want to hold you."  

 

After saying something that romantic, Erol looks so embarrassed that Rory can't get him to talk for the rest of the car ride.  But maybe that's not embarrassment, maybe Erol's just tired.  Because now he's leaning against the car window and closing his eyes, and smiling.

 

\---

 

Once they reach Erol's place there's an unspoken acknowledgement between them: before they talk, they make time for messy kisses on the bed.  Two weeks is an impossibly long time when you've never had to be away from the person you love before, and all of a sudden Rory needs to replenish his supply of memories, of the way Erol tastes and smells and the way his hands feel against Rory's skin, the way he breathes in quickly so he can kiss Rory again.  

 

"Tell me everything," Rory says, finally lying back against Erol's chest.  Erol loosely links his hands around Rory's waist.  

 

So Erol does.  The story, illustrated with Erol's Polaroids, is so much more complicated than it seemed from the postcard—Erol's surprising friendship with Maria, the way Nesrin died, the fact that Fatma was never actually disowned by her father.  Faruk must have been, because Erol makes no mention of his family.  The shock he felt upon getting Rory's postcard; "You seem better, but how are you _really_?" Erol finishes.

 

It's then to Rory to explain everything that happened back at home.  His football game, his fight with Williams, playing records for Glyn, "and I've been out with Mae a few times," Rory finishes, holding his breath and hoping Erol won't be too angry.

 

Instead, he doesn't even mention it.

 

"My boyfriend the DJ," says Erol with a smile.

 

"Hmm," says Rory.  "That's all right then?  'Boyfriend'?  And..."  He laughs.  "I guess 'DJ' too."

 

"Yeah," says Erol.  "And if you could even believe it, I think all this talking is killing my throat," he says.  "And I think I'd like to kiss you again for a bit."

 

"I'd like that just fine," says Rory.  

 

Erol gives him the kind of kiss that inevitably leads to roaming hands and finds them later, naked in each other's arms in the bed, Erol nuzzling into Rory's neck and Rory feeling an immense happiness as he closes his eyes.  His last coherent thought is that he's going to lose his mind completely, and he won't regret a single moment.

 

\---

 

It's Going Underground, Thursday night.  Rory and Erol have back to back sets; truly back to back, when you think about it, because they're so crammed into such a small space behind the DJ booth that they can't help touching.  Rory loves it.  When he's there amidst the sweat and colored lights the part of him that holds his fear disappears.  He doesn't mind Erol's body next to him, doesn't mind Erol's fingers squeezing his hand, unnoticed by the crowd that just comes for the sounds and loses itself in the music.

 

"Where can I find a bird like that?"  That's Glyn, tapping Rory on the shoulder.  Mae has just waved to him as she goes over to the bar.  She looks gorgeous.  Her dress is black and silky and low, and she has earrings with tiny feathers that brush her bare shoulders.  It looks like Glyn may even be about to run up and talk to her, but Gerald intervenes, slipping an arm around her waist and kissing her right next to her ear.  Rory turns away.

 

"Mae's one of a kind," he says.  

 

"You know, Rory, you probably could have intervened just then," Glyn says.  "That was a look of longing she was giving you."

 

"Eh, could have been," Rory says with a shrug.  "But I'm not interested."

 

"You'll never pull a girl with an attitude like that, Rory."  Glyn puts a hand on his shoulder.  "That's why you've been so unlucky in love, see."  Rory hears a strange noise behind him, and realizes Erol is doubled over, laughing so hard he has begun to wheeze a little.  He pulls himself up to his full height.   
  
"Did you really just say that, Glyn?"  

 

"What...?"  

 

"Just saying I think he pulls just fine," Erol clarifies, and squeezes Rory with an arm around his waist.  

 

" _You're—_ " Glyn starts, and then shakes his head.  "All my friends are gay.  Does that say something about me?"  Rory wriggles out of Erol's grasp.

 

"Probably that you're good looking.  Which you are."  It all comes out very quickly.  Rory isn't really used to the business of flirting with people, even in a friendly way.  Glyn just laughs and rubs Rory's head affectionately.

 

It sets the mood for the three of them the rest of the evening.  They joke and shove each other around, interrupt each other's sets to put on gangsta rap and Flock of Seagulls tunes, and just when the people on the floor seem tired of not being in on the joke, Erol puts on something incredible that gets everyone dancing.  And at one point, Rory does the same, leading Erol to squeeze his hand even tighter than usual under the table.  Fingers white and a smile plastered on his face, Rory is having the night of his life.

 

Just as he and Erol are leaving, Rory glances behind him to see Mae with Gerald's arm around her.  She turns to look at him and her face is covered in tears, her eyes red.  The look she's giving him couldn't be more clear than if she'd told him to fuck off to his face.  He turns away.

 

\---

 

Summer finally hits London near the end of July; better late than never, Rory thinks.  A wave of dry heat settles over the city, and it is 1995 and the world is full of possibility.  His ankle slowly heals, though he'll walk with a limp for a while.  At his parents' urging, he finds work in a department store selling clothes to people who would have scoffed at him had they seen him on the street.  Being in a uniform really works wonders.  He still spends all his money on records, and his breaks talking about music with Alex, the one coworker who has been friendly to him so far.  He plays parties for extra cash, and passes his driving test in mid-August.  

 

At the very end of summer Jamie and Amelia have a gorgeous wedding in a garden.  It's the strangest Phillips wedding Rory has ever been to, because it's small; only immediate families and very close friends are there, and because it's in a garden.  The other weddings in the family have all been in massive churches and have been properly Catholic, long and traditional.  As it turns out, Amelia's family is Anglican.  As it turns out, this has been a point of great argument amongst the Phillipses and nearly led to the two of them never getting married at all.  Rory guesses he actually owes Amelia more than he could ever know.  In any case, it ends up being a nice wedding, as weddings go, and Rory finds himself being recruited for a football match afterward, where he plays goalkeeper for some of Amelia's small nieces and nephews.  He kicks off his shoes and socks, and somehow his mother isn't even upset when he comes home with grass stains all over his trousers.  

 

September sees Rory going back to school for the last time in his life; he has now come to see it as an utter waste of time but still puts the work in so he can potentially move up the job ladder.  He still works at the store on weekends, and goes to see Erol DJ on Thursdays.  There's suddenly less time for random concertgoing, so he and Erol collaborate to find the best possible shows to see and make sure they have room in their schedules to attend them.  Afterwards, it's always out to a cafe—possibly Rose's—for late night snacks and then home to Erol's flat, where they'll kiss until their lips are sore and go to bed together.  

 

"What's funny?" Erol asks him one night, while he runs his hand over the lock of Rory's hair that has grown a bit too long at the back of his neck.  

 

"Nothing," says Rory.  "I'm just laughing because I realized that I have no bloody idea what I'm going to do with my future, and I don't care at all."

 

"I couldn't tell you much about my future either," Erol admits, "But I know you're going to be in it, so it must be all right."

 

"Love you, Erol."

 

"Love you."

 

Rory is finding that exchanging 'I love you's doesn't give him the same crazy rush that it once did, but he thinks that's because the fear is gone.  Instead, he just feels a little blissful, a warmth that starts in his toes and spreads upward.  In fact, everything about his and Erol's relationship now just feels like a natural part of his life.  He no longer has to think very hard about the implications for his own sexuality, or argue with Erol about how much attention is too much.  They know everything about living with and around each other now.  It's almost like Erol has become a member of his family, except that Rory never gets the feeling that he wouldn't bother with Erol if he weren't family, which admittedly he sometimes does with his own brothers.  

 

Speaking of, it's now just himself and Archie living in the house, and Rory is living as much at Erol's as at his parents' home.  At this point it seems that Rory's parents hardly care at all about what he does with his life, but to Rory's shock he finds he isn't really inclined to spend a lot of time partying or playing truant.  The purpose of everything he does is gradually illuminated.  

 

It's been almost a year since he met Erol.  And what a year it's been.

 

\---

 

"Rory?" says Erol's familiar voice over the phone.

 

"Yeah."

 

"Hi it's Erol – come over now – got to go – bye."  Rory hears the click of Erol hanging up on the other end.  Nervously he gets his coat on; shaking he makes his way to the bus stop.  He can't sit still on the bus ride to the Tube and the Tube ride to Islington, noticing every little sound he hears or person that nudges against his shoulder.  Erol did not sound happy.  Something awful must have happened.  Something in the family, maybe?  But if it's something in the family, why does he need Rory to come over?

 

By the time Rory actually gets his key in the door, he's practically hyperventilating, and thinking he's going to be the one who needs help to calm down.  He bursts into Erol's flat feeling like the floor is giving him electric shocks.

 

Mae is on the sofa wrapped in a blanket.  Her face is swollen from crying, her eyes red.  She has a full cup of tea in her hand and it isn't steaming so she must have been holding that for a while.  Her eyes flick up to Rory.

 

"Oh," she says in a tiny voice, her expression staying blank.  "Hi, Rory."

 

Erol appears from the kitchen with a new cup of tea.  He takes her current cup and tries to bend her fingers around the new one.

 

"Really Erol, it's all right."  Her voice reminds Rory of the way it sounded the first time they met.  Quiet, like she's trying not to be heard.  Guiltily he remembers that night at Going Underground, when she was crying like this too.  Of course he's seen her since then, at the club—she's been over to his less lately, probably because Gerald was a bit jealous.  She had just worked out a huge argument with Gerald that time at Going Underground, she told him.  So, maybe naively, he's been under the assumption that everything was all right.

 

"Let me steal Rory for a moment," Erol says, and pulls Rory into the kitchen.  He puts a cold damp hand to Rory's cheek against the counter and buries his head in Rory's neck.  "What do I do, Rory?  She's not right, something's gone horribly wrong and I have no idea what to do.  Can you do something?"  

 

"Erol, calm down," says Rory, trying to keep his own voice steady.  He puts a hand on Erol's broad back, rubs it in circles.  "Did she tell you what's happened?"

 

"No," says Erol loudly, evidently having as much trouble as Rory is with the whole 'calming down' thing.  "She was crying and could hardly get a word out, but she said she wanted to see you."

 

"All right.  Here."  Rory steps back and leans up to kiss Erol's lips.  It's so tempting to just forget everything in a kiss, but he knows he'll have more chances for kisses later.  "I'll go talk to her."

 

He goes back into the other room and sits down next to Mae.  Erol is following close behind, still looking worried.  

 

"Do you want to talk about anything?" Rory asks.  Mae shakes her head.  "Are you sure?"

 

"I—"  Her voice sounds like it's about to break.  "I need to leave London," she says quietly.  "Gerald and I are—well, we _aren't_ , you see...and I really couldn't stay with my family.  It was awful.  All I did was lie on my bed and cry."  She looks up at Rory like she wants him to put his arm around her, but he doesn't do it, seeing Erol a few paces behind.  "I just wanted to come round and say goodbye to you.  I thought you were living here."  She sniffles.  "I'm sorry to worry you."

 

"You can't leave," Rory says dumbly.  "You're part of London.  You're part of what makes Going Underground so amazing.  You're like—you've been one of my closest friends, apart from Erol."

 

"Where will I go in London?" she asks, her eyes dark.  "I lived with Gerald.  I'm poor.  I work in a shop.  There's nothing left for me here, except things that remind me of what I don't want to remember."  Rory has a feeling that something worse than just a breakup happened, but Mae said she didn't want to talk.

 

"You could stay here," says Erol.  Rory thinks he might have imagined it at first.  "I mean," he goes on.  "You're not allergic to cats are you?"

 

"No," says Mae softly.  "But I couldn't do that.  It wouldn't be right."

 

"How about you stay here for the weekend," says Erol, "And then we figure it out from there?"

 

Mae lifts her cup of tea and takes a sip, then frowns, presumably because it's gone lukewarm.  And then she looks over at Rory and starts to cry.

 

\---

 

Rory stays over that night, and the three of them watch _The War of the Worlds_ on television.  Erol hardly says a word, spending most of his time in the kitchen picking at a plate of cold chips with vinegar.  Mae only speaks to Cassius, pulling him into her lap despite his protests and cooing at him, until he finally bites her hand and has her hopping about the kitchen looking for iodine or something to pour on it.  So Rory is left doing the talking, chattering awkwardly about anything unrelated to Gerald that he can think of.  He talks about Jamie's wedding, about DJing, about his work and about school. 

 

Mae falls asleep on the sofa, but Rory and Erol can't sleep.  It seems strange to have sex when they have a guest, but Erol is straddling Rory on his bed and kissing him under his ear, and Rory knows it's what Erol needs.  

 

"Why are you doing this?" he says when they've both finished, and Erol is holding Rory tightly like he's afraid Rory will disappear if he lets go.

 

"I don't know," says Erol.  He stays silent for a while—maybe a few minutes, maybe half an hour—and  then very softly says, "I did it for you, Rory.  And I've already made my decision, so there's no use telling me to do any different.  I know it might be a bad idea, but I'll figure it out.  I'll do stupid things if it means making you happy."

 

Rory does want to argue, but he pushes it aside.  

 

"You're really brave, Erol," he says instead.  

 

"I'm just an idiot," Erol says.

 

"Details, details."

 

\---

\---

 

There is a girl in Erol's flat.  

 

This is a first for him—that is, it's not the first time a girl has ever set foot in his flat, not at all, but it's the first time a girl has ever come to stay.  And Erol is beginning to regret his decision.  No, who is he fooling?  He knew it was a bad decision from the start.  She's obviously just here because she has her eye on Erol's boyfriend.  She's worryingly pretty.  Erol's gay but he's not _blind_.  Mae is a lovely girl, like something out of a Victorian picture book, with perfect dark curls and pale skin.  Her figure is more 'girl next door' than 'centerfold', but when she's not upset she holds herself very well and draws attention to herself.

 

And then Erol thinks he's being ridiculous.  Even if Mae would do anything for Rory, Rory is quite firmly attached to Erol.  In fact, when Erol goes over to check his answerphone, it turns out Rory has left a message on it telling Erol to phone his house if Erol needs him.  

 

Erol goes over to check on Mae.  She's still asleep on the couch.  He touches her wrist to make sure she still has a pulse.  She may have taken pills or something for all he knows.  Regardless, it seems the touch has roused her, because she's now stirring, stretching her arms out the way Cassius stretches his legs and blinking. 

 

"Where am I?" she says in her tiny voice.  

 

"You're staying at my place," says Erol, trying to be reassuring.  He puts a hand on her shoulder for emphasis.  She crumples a little under his touch and looks down.  "Your bags are still in the hall."

 

"I told you not to do this."  Partially Erol thinks she meant to do exactly this, but he doesn't say a word.  

 

"Do you want some breakfast?"

 

"No."

 

Erol makes breakfast anyway, a fried egg for each of them and a bowl of yogurt with granola flakes mixed in.  By the time Mae finishes, she's teasing him about his vegetarian breakfasts and asking him where he's hiding the sausage.  The only possible response to this of course is saying "in my trousers" while pulling up on his waistband.  Erol's not ashamed.  

 

And then after she's showered and changed from one set of black clothes into another set, she's talking him through how she's going to pay her rent.  She hasn't actually left her job in London; she claims she was running away from home as a brash and sudden decision.  Erol doesn't comment.  She's still not the loudmouthed flirt and constant joker that Erol remembers from many a night at Going Underground, but she's coherent at least.  She's talking through how they can divide the flat up so that there are two bedrooms when she frowns.

 

"This is ridiculous," she says.  "Really stupid.  I can't live here."  Erol's sudden unwillingness to let her go makes him realize something.

  
"I can deal with ridiculous," he says.  "I really don't want to live alone."

 

"You've got Cassius," she says, and from her lack of expression Erol isn't sure whether she's dead serious or about to burst into laughter.  And then she does neither, she just starts crying instead.  This is the thing Erol doesn't know how to deal with, the crying.  He didn't know how when it was his mum, and he doesn't know how now.  

 

"Here," he says, and rushes for the stack of Polaroids.  "Look, here's my grandfather's house."

 

"I can't believe you're doing this," she says, a smile starting to creep up onto her lips even though she's still crying.  Should he offer her a handkerchief?  "Do you have small brothers and sisters then?  That's what we had to do when Charlotte and Anthony were small, if they started crying we had to give them something colorful and they'd get distracted."

 

"No, I'm an only child, I'm just really clueless," he snaps back, "And I'm doing my best."  

 

"No, no, I'm not trying to insult you."  She inhales.  "I'm really awful about that.  I always insult people by accident.  I think you're being really sweet."  Eyes widening, she reaches for the photos, angling her head to get a better view.  "Where is that?  That can't be in England."

 

"No, didn't Rory tell you?  It's Cyprus.  I just spent two weeks there in late May, early June."

 

"Er..."  Mae looks a little ashamed.  "I'm so thick.  Where is Cyprus?"

 

"It's a little island in the Mediterranean," he says, "But don't feel bad.  I'd never been out of England before myself."

 

"Even though your family's from there?"

 

"I never really knew about them before.  They were...kind of estranged."

 

"And no brothers and sisters either?  How...quiet everything must have been."  Mae gets a distant look in her eyes, and starts to flip through the pictures.  "Oh Erol, these are beautiful.  The ones of your grandmother—she looks amazing."  Erol doesn't correct her.  

 

"You have the two younger siblings then?" he asks instead, trying to get a picture of what Mae's home life must be like.

 

"Oh yes, two younger and four older," she says.  "And two sisters in law, and two nieces and nephews, and loads and loads of aunts and uncles and cousins and cousins' babies.  Irish Catholics, you know—it's just cultural, everyone keeps having babies until they literally can't anymore, and the older ones help out with the little ones, and if you get five square feet to yourself you're damn lucky."  She laughs.

 

"Sounds like hell," Erol says, although he wants to take it back because generally he tries not to go around insulting people's families.  

 

"Oh, it can be.  And my family's crazy, it's our reputation.  Every time one of us does something strange, it's just 'oh, you know the way the Fitzpatricks are'."  She looks back down at the photos.  "But it's nice, I guess, because whenever I needed someone to talk to, my sister Lora was always there, and my brothers Thom and Rich would keep older boys from bothering me, and my brother Roger was like a best friend since we're nearly the same age."  With a sigh, she flips to the next picture.  "But I couldn't stay there anymore.  I wanted to be young again, for a little while, but it didn't work.  I just found myself wanting to get away as much as I did the first time when I moved in with Gerald."

 

"I know how it feels," says Erol.  "Even if my family is really small, there's still good and bad points.  I don't think I could possibly live there anymore though considering this is, well, this is where I sleep with my boyfriend, and now my parents know I'm gay."

 

"And they were upset about it?"  Mae looks concerned.

 

"Mostly.  I think they've agreed to just deal with it overall, but it's like, they don't want to talk about it."  Interestingly, it occurs to Erol that Mae probably isn't after Rory if she is actually concerned about Erol.  If she just wanted to steal his boyfriend she'd probably hate him, wouldn't that make sense?

 

"Oh."  Then her face lights up, like she's just remembered something.  "Oh, and I don't mind if you sleep with Rory in here.  I'll just find some far corner and put on headphones, or go for a walk."  Ha, she is definitely serious about this now.

 

"And you can bring home whoever you like," Erol says, smiling slightly.  At that point there is a lull in the conversation, and Cassius, being a cat regardless of whether he is a small stupid one whose pastimes mainly consist of eating things that are edible and biting things that aren't, hops up onto the sofa and starts butting his head against Erol's arm.  "He's hungry."  Erol picks up the kitten and goes into the kitchen, Mae tagging along, and (as Erol has forgotten to do the shopping) they rummage through the fridge together for items edible for a cat.

 

\---

 

Rory comes round a bit later to make sure everyone is all right, and for some bizarre reason he's brought groceries.  Erol did not even mention needing food on the phone, but Rory says that his mum somehow figured they'd need food.  Mums are good about that sort of thing.  Maybe it will keep them balanced, having a girl in the flat.

 

Mae offers to help in the kitchen.  To Erol's amusement, she has no idea what she's doing; she explains bashfully that most of the cooking she has done at home involved dumping meat and vegetables into a big pot and boiling them in broth.  Erol decides that she could do to learn some of Maria's recipes, and he finds the one he has for a vegetarian moussaka.   

 

"What the fuck is this?" Mae and Rory both say upon seeing the ingredients, which are of course written out in Turkish.  Rory makes a big show of trying to pronounce all the Turkish words, and instead spewing nonsense.  

 

"I've probably just said I'm a pregnant blue telephone," he says, sighing.  "So what is in this actually?"

  
"Potatoes and aubergine," Erol explains.

 

"So it's basically a shepherd's pie," says Mae.  

 

"Greek style," Rory agrees.  

 

It ends up looking a mess but tasting rather delicious, and again they watch television until bedtime.  Rory goes home for the evening, confessing he was nearly falling asleep at work in the morning, but not before giving Erol the kind of deep, long kiss that makes him want more.  

 

And so Erol can't sleep.  He leans against his wall and listens to Mae crying in the next room.  Maybe he should go to her, maybe he should offer his ears and his shoulder to cry on, but instead he puts a pillow on top of his head.  

 

\---

 

But the fact is that Mae doesn't need someone to tell her troubles to.  It seems to be the comforts of life that draw her out of this dark state.  Erol keeps teaching Mae recipes and showing her photos, until at some point it stops being like he's taking care of her and starts being like they're friends.  They get ready for Going Underground together, Mae cursing out Cassius for trying to eat her nylons, and the two of them helping each other with eyeliner.  

 

Watching bad late-night television becomes a regular activity for the three of them.  A bag of crisps, a few cans of beer, and anything whose idea of special effects involves spray-painted cardboard and Vocoders is Erol's idea of perfection.  Especially if Rory is in his arms, occasionally kissing him sloppily—Mae rolls her eyes but doesn't really care, and there's this sort of crazy boldness to being able to kiss Rory in front of someone else, anyone else.  

 

And one day Mae falls asleep there on Rory's shoulder, and Erol just nestles his head into Rory's neck, and wonders if maybe they aren't becoming a family.

 

\---

 

It's in the late winter, say, January '96, when Erol starts fighting with Glyn.  It's probably inevitable that it would happen; they both have big enough egos when it comes to what they do behind the DJ booth, but it's made worse by the bitterness of the weather.  It seems like the worst winter in ages.  Rory and Mae seem to see it mostly as an excuse for throwing snow at each other and at Erol, but Erol finds himself longing for the endless sun and the sea.  So somehow he takes it out on Glyn.

 

It is admittedly a stupid, stupid, stupid fight, but Erol has his indie kid pride and Glyn his own; Glyn wants to play more mad sparkly Italo like Harry Thumann and what the fuck, Patrick Cowley.  

 

"No one," he raves,  "Is going to dance to Patrick bloody Cowley!"  There's this whole brilliant British indie scene blossoming what with the Manics and recently a new Blur album "Although let's not talk about Blur 'cause all they do lately is bitch about each other; let's talk about people like the Super Furries who you know are going to be huge--"

 

"It's not dance music though, Erol, that stuff's brilliant but it clears dance floors!"

 

"Well then I'll—I dunno, somehow I'll make it into dance music."  He kind of wants to throw a snowball at Glyn's face.  "Did you notice you have shit hair?" he mutters.

 

"What?"

 

"Nothing.  I mean, there's so much brilliant stuff coming out of Wales and actually of the US even, lately, so I can't see why all you want to play is music—admittedly good music—that's decades old.  I mean--"

 

"If you want to have indie rock acts," Glyn says, between blowing on his hands to keep them warm, "It's really best to have bands in for live performances."

 

"And that's exactly what we ought to do," says Erol, while at the same time Glyn is saying, "Which is not the sort of thing that Going Underground was meant for."

 

And this argument goes on until spring, at which point neither of them can take it any longer, and Going Underground is suddenly no more.

 

\---

 

Starting a night is not easy.  But by the end of May, it's something Erol knows he has to do.  He can't go on without a regular gig.  People are still asking him to play sets, but he misses the way Going Underground was like a haven for a certain group of people, who have now sort of dispersed and who only reconvene at various shows (such as the final appearance of the Charming Thieves, whose 'creative differences' mainly amounted to 'couldn't take any of Lionel's shit anymore' but who nevertheless managed to draw tears from a knowing few who'd been there from the beginning).

 

At least Erol's in contact with the folks at Plastic People, one of whom, Ade, has decided to start bothering him about the fact that Going Underground has disappeared.  He insists that Erol should do something about the emptiness of Monday nights at the club, which Erol won't even listen to at first.  Who goes out on a Monday night?

 

"Why, people who wouldn't go out otherwise," Ade offers, which is deliciously tempting but Erol ignores it for a while.

 

Then he starts complaining to James, who is incidentally the friend who Mae used to be casually seeing in years past, and James (who has been doing a number of live sets alongside Erol lately anyway as it were) starts going on about how they should glam it up a bit.  Going Underground had that sort of late glam rock thing going in the first place, but it was more Robert Smith and Adam Ant than, fuck, Bolan or anything.  And so then it's two of them dreaming, scheming, maybe even planning.

 

All along Rory is close at Erol's side, even though he's clearly more interested in Glyn's choice of dance music for the time being.  In order to rectify this, Erol plays nothing but glam rock, classic and recent, in the house.  At this point, Rory has finished school and has officially moved in, so these marathons sometimes stretch for entire weekends, just the two of them (sometimes joined by Mae) getting stoned and lying in each other's arms, listening to music.

 

When Placebo hit the charts, everyone goes absolutely insane over them and Mae starts videotaping all their TV appearances, having developed a not insignificant crush on Mr. Brian Molko, which Rory thinks makes her "a massive lez" because Brian looks so girlish especially in lipgloss.  "Actually, I'm bisexual, thank you very much," she shoots back, which becomes a constant point of teasing in the household for no particular reason.

 

And then, just as the first chills of autumn settle in, comes a new album from Suede, one that strikes the fancy of all three inhabitants of that flat, but especially Erol, who gets stuck on the first track, plays it over and over.  There's something about that song, those words, that fits in with exactly what Ade was talking about.  People that don't quite fit with the rest of club culture for whatever reason, people that sort of stalk the night looking for new and interesting things that aren't born of a world totally alien to them.  And most of all, Rory, the way he loves Rory, the way he dares the world to try and stop them now, the way Rory just seems to be the thing that makes sense in the moments of most dire alienation and equally in those of the most perfect complete joy.  

 

 _We're trash, me and you.  It's in everything we do_.

 

Trash, he thinks, that's just the thing.  He'll call it Trash. 


End file.
